Slap
by becky2102
Summary: See, Olivia, blood is blood.   And here's the thing, after ten years Olivia…after ten years you are my blood
1. Chapter 1

Don't own anything, not making money off it, etc….

Chapter 1

Olivia sat at her desk and rubbed her eyes. It had been a long morning. She looked at the clock on her computer screen. It was only 1130. She was working on her third cup of coffee. She took another swig of the coffee and stood back up. She joined her colleagues outside the first interrogation room. She'd given it her best, and her best was damn good, and the man inside still wouldn't crack. They liked him for the kidnapping and murder of an 8 year old, and if they were as good as they thought they were, they could link him to at least 3 or 4 others. Now though, they needed to get something from him. Fin had tried, she'd tried, she AND Elliot had tried and now Elliot was going at him on his own.

Inside the interrogation room, their suspect sat cool as a cucumber. Elliot matched his demeanor as he tried a different tactic. Tried to be his friend, someone who understood. Someone who understood the frustrations of children, but how in the end you still loved them so much. Olivia was hopeful. Elliot was good, he'd break this guy after all. Suddenly there was a palpable shift in the air. The suspect turned and leered at Elliot.

"You have kids, don't you?" he asked Elliot.

"Yeah," he replied slowly. "I got kids."

"UhmmHmm," their suspect replied. Olivia wouldn't have believed the change in this guy. He went from average joe to slinky perp in a split second. "I bet you like this job because it makes you feel useful, putting sickos away. Protecting your kids from the big bad wolf. Well, you must not be very good at it, people still out there killing little girls. Not very good at all. " He looked up at Elliot, who had stilled. "What's the matter, Detective? I hit a nerve? Big bad cop not man enough to take care of his kids?" He sneered at Elliot and in that split second Elliot fist caught him in the jaw, knocking his chair backwards. Elliot grabbed him by the neck and pulled him up to take another swing at him when Cragen grabbed his pulled back arm. All of a sudden Olivia was in front of him, between him and the suspect. Cragen was pulling him out of the interrogation room and Fin was putting a shaken, but still whole, suspect back in the chair.

"You. Upstairs. NOW!" Cragen barked at Elliot. Elliot shook his head as if clearing his own mind and marched up to the locker room.

Olivia just shook her head. Something was wrong with her partner and she didn't know what. She suspected it had something to do with his family. Whenever things were tense with Kathy, or rotten with the kids, he was a monster at work. When things were bad at work, he was rotten at home. After years of being partners, she knew how he worked. She needed to get him to open up to someone or he would break. His anger would be too much someday. Walking back to her desk for yet another cup of coffee, Olivia sighed a heavy sigh. Elliot was a good partner, the best, and her friend, probably her best friend, but damn, he was complicated and took a lot of work.

She gave it 15 minutes. Time to let his knuckles stop burning and his head to clear. She bolstered herself with another swig of coffee, grimacing as it burned her nostrils. 'Munch must have made this round,' she thought. She headed upstairs towards her partner.

Reaching the top of the stairs she heard a loud banging. Opening the door to the locker room she saw Elliot standing in front of a very dented locker. His right hand still in a fist. He was panting. "Elliot?" she called softly. His head dropped to his chest so she knew he had heard her.

"Elliot," she said again as she walked towards him. "What is going on? "

"Ah…I….I dunno, Liv," he admitted after a second.

"This is not about Fletcher, is it?" referring to the guy still sitting downstairs in the interrogation room. She'd seen him get worked up and take a swing at a suspect or a perp before, but she'd never seen him attach a locker because he couldn't get a confession. It was still way to early in the case for that level of frustration.

"She's gonna take my kids, Olivia. She's gonna take my babies. She says I'm not there enough, that I work too much, am unreliable. She wants to leave and she's gonna take my children." She heard his voice crack as he spoke through his fingers, hands over his face.

"Oh Elliot." Olivia's heart was breaking for her partner. She knew everything he did, he did for his family. "Kathy…Kathy said that? They're your family, Elliot. She knows that. She can't take your family. She wouldn't do that to you." Olivia tried her best to comfort him. She didn't know if those words were entirely true, but she thought it was what he needed to hear most.

She could tell that it wasn't exactly working. He was still tense, she could see the muscles tensing under his shirt. She took another couple of steps towards him.

"She loves you, Elliot. The stresses of the job are hard on her too. Talk to her, don't shut her out. She is your family, El." She reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder.

Without warning, he spun around towards her, his eyes spitting fire, glazed over and unfocused. His hands clenched and unclenched into fists.

"STOP TELLING ME WHAT TO DO." He yelled at her. Olivia almost took a step backwards at the ferocity of his voice. The shock was evident on her face but she recovered fairly quickly.

"Elliot, you've told me before she thinks family is the most important thing. She knows—" her soft voice of encouragement was cut off by a hiss coming from his mouth.

"Shut up. Just shut up, Olivia." She flinched again at the anger in his tone, directed at her. "What are you trying to give me advice for anyway? What do you know about family? A rapist father and a drunken mother? Who are you to give me advice on how to take care of my family. You don't have kids. You don't have anybody." The words were angry, the tone hard.

Her stomach dropped to the floor at the same time her hand flew up of its own accord and slapped him across the face. Almost as quickly his hand flew up and hit her hard across the face, his palm stinging. Her head jerked to the side, cheek burning. Her hands flew up in front of her and he grabbed her left hand in his upraised right one as his left swung across and slapped her on the other side of her face. She gasped as his ring cut into her skin. She didn't move. He was grasping her tight, her left wrist in his fist. She could feel his finger nails digging into her skin and she let out and involuntary gasp as she felt something in her wrist pop and then a deep interior pain. She didn't fight back; she simply stood there, waiting. Waiting for another blow, waiting for another verbal assault, just waiting.

Elliot's blue eyes were almost black; they were unfocused and unblinking. He was looking at her without really seeing her. She didn't think he was seeing anything but red right then. She didn't know how long they stood there. When the pain in her wrist got too much to bear, she broke out of his grasp, rather easily and darted for the door, leaving Elliot much in the same position that she had found him.

Olivia ducked out of the locker room and into the women's restroom next door. Thankfully the area had been empty and no one had seen. She didn't think the damage was bad, but needed to make sure before she headed downstairs. She looked in the mirror. Both cheeks were red. She could see the outline of a hand, but she doubted anyone else would without knowing what to look for. Underneath her right eye was a cut, 'from his wedding ring - ironic' she thought. It was bleeding, but not badly. It would start to bruise soon, so would her lip, which she felt tingling. She ran the water cold and placed a wet papertowel over the cut, holding pressure. In 5 minutes, the bleeding had stopped. She looked at herself again, straightened her clothes. She'd do, as long as nobody looked too carefully at her. She headed down the stairs, grabbed a stack of paperwork from her desk without missing a stride and went straight for Cragen's office.

She knocked and entered when she heard him bark "Come in." She opened the door and slid in, keeping her back to the doorframe.

"Olivia, what do you need?" He asked, barely looking up from the stacks of paperwork on his desk.

She took a breath. "I'm done."

He stopped what he had been doing and looked up at her. "Excuse me?"

"I'm done, Don. I can't do this. Either he gets his head shrunk, gets his head out of his ass or I'm done. I cannot, will not, work with him like this."

"Olivia…" the Captain said with a warning tone, "Don't say things you will regret later."

"I won't regret this later, Cap," she said with finality.

"What did he say to you? What did he do?" the older man asked.

She ran her fingers through her short brown hair as she took a deep breath. "Don't ask questions you don't want the answer to, Captain."

He walked around the desk towards the detective, who he cared deeply for. "Olivia, what did Elliot do?"

"Who…What…" she stumbled over her words. "Whoever…WHATever that was. THAT was not Elliot Stabler. Either he sees a shrink or I'm done here. I'm taking the rest of the day off, I'm taking these files, I'll work from home." She said it as a statement, but she looked at him for his approval. He gave a slight nod and she headed out the side door of his office.

Captain Cragen brought one hand to his mouth and blew into his fist. What the hell was he going to do with this mess.

Olivia practically jogged out of the building, flagging a cab in front of the station. 'One lucky break,' she thought, as the biting cold wind cut through her thin button-down shirt. She'd left her coat inside and it was below freezing outside. Jumping into the back of the cab, the cabbie looked back at her already shivering form. "You forget your coat, Miss? Run back in and get it, I'll wait."

"No, it's okay, just…" she replied, then stopped as she say Cragen walking down the steps with her coat and bag.

He passed them through the window to her, saying "Olivia, are you SURE you are okay? This isn't like you…"

"Yes, Cap, Fine. I promise." She turned and leaned towards the cabbie, giving him her address less than a mile away.

Her boss stood and stared again as he watched the cab drive off.

Inside the precinct, Fin and Munch were still staring at each other. They hadn't seen Olivia come down the stairs, entering the bullpen from the Interrogation Room only shortly before Elliot came down the stairs. They saw their Captain leave an empty office, throw open Benson's desk and grab her shoulder bag, grab her down coat from the coat rack and hurry out the front door.

"What the hell what that about?" Fin asked, a little cranky himself.

Munch shook his head. "No Idea. Hey, Stabler, where's your partner?"

Elliot glanced up from the messages he was pretending to read and glanced around. Where WAS his partner? "Dunno." He looked again, forehead creased. He'd been so preoccupied about how he was going to apologize he hadn't thought about where she'd gone when she left. Elliot jumped up and headed back upstairs. Checking the cribs, the locker room and then the women's bathroom and finding them all empty, he started slowly back downstairs. He was still trying to remember exactly what had happened in the locker room. He'd been punching the locker, Olivia had come in, had said something to him. Then he remembered yelling at her. In his mind it was static, he could remember yelling but not what he'd said. He remembered hearing the crack of a hand across a face, one, two times? Three times? His? Hers? His own cheek stung but so did his hand. What the hell had happened up there. He started to panic. He couldn't remember, not what he'd said, not what he'd done. And now Olivia was gone. What HAD he done?

As he walked as slow as possible down the stairs back into the bullpen, he saw his Captain coming back inside. He caught the end of what he was telling Fin and Munch. "—gone home for the day, not feeling well. You two will have to interview the rest of the witnesses on your own." Elliot, get the ADA in here to talk about what to do with that loser," gesturing to the room where their suspect still sat. "Then meet me in my office."

Cragen paced in his office. What the hell was he going to do. Taking the job as the boss sounded good in practice, but they never prepared you for the majority of decisions you had to make. Fifteen minutes passed before Elliot knocked on his door.

"Elliot," the older man said. "Sit down." It was a command, not an offer. Elliot figured that out quickly and sat in one of the chairs opposite the old wooden desk. Cragen sat, playing with a pen, before he tossed in angrily onto the desk.

"You need to see a shrink, Elliot." He figured it was the only way. Olivia was right. He himself, as Captain, should have seen this coming. He could do this and try to keep Benson, and hopefully both of them, but if he didn't he would lose them both.

"WHAT? What the hell is going on here? Over that loser? I barely touched him. You and I both know I've done far worse, " Elliot said accusingly.

"It isn't about him, he is only a very small part of it," Cragen replied.

"What's the other part?" the detective demanded.

"I've been given an ultimatum. I don't want to lose a good detective," Cragen said straight.

"An ultimatum? By the brass? You're going to fire me if I don't see a shrink? How do they even know—" He was cut off by his boss.

"It's not you I am worried about losing. "

Elliot looked up at him. Cragen didn't say anything, but allowed Elliot to put it together himself. "Olivia?" he asked, the shock evident in his voice. "Olivia asked you to fire me if I don't see a shrink?" He was incredulous, that his partner, his FRIEND would do that, even after today, AND that Cragen would consider it.

"No, Elliot, of course not. She said she would quit. She said you needed to get help or she'd quit. And I believe her." Cragen looked at the younger man for his response.

"Look, whatever she said to you about today, we'll work it out. It wasn't…I didn't mean to…."

"Elliot, she didn't tell me anything about what happened today. What DID happen? All I know is that there are two very bruised lockers upstairs and I have a detective who is VERY VERY good at her job telling me she is going to quit. I don't want to lose either of you, OR both of you. So, you tell me what you are going to do."

Elliot sat in the chair, flabbergasted. 'How the hell was he supposed to defend himself when he couldn't even remember what happened,' he thought.

"Can you even do that? Make me see a shrink for no reason?" Elliot asked, defensive again.

"No reason? Elliot I have a thousand reasons, any one of which are enough to get you a seat in front of Huang for the next six months. If Olivia…OLIVIA….of all people says you need to see someone, I'm going to listen to her. For your sake, not just hers." He looked at Elliot, daring him to object.

He didn't. "Okay," he said. Then, more quietly, "Okay. What do I do now?"

"Go back to work, solve this case. I'm already down one detective. I'll call Huang, set something up unless you want to see someone else." Cragen looked up in question.

"No, Huang's fine." Elliot stood and turned towards the office door. Before he opened the door he turned back. "Cap?" The older man looked up, hoping he didn't look as tired as he felt. "Liv okay?"

"Yeah," he replied. "She's okay. But you asking makes me wonder why she wouldn't be."

Elliot pursed his lips and walked out the door.

Olivia, true to her word, worked through the files all afternoon and evening. She ordered tacos for dinner from the taqueria down the street, only ate half of one and tried not to think about the disaster of a day. Elliot's words kept running over and over through her head. As the throbbing in her wrist got worse, the words got louder and louder. She had a pounding headache. Grabbing two Tylenol from the bathroom cabinet, she looked in the mirror. There were circles under her eyes, the small cut on her cheek under her outer right eye was red and angry looking, surrounded by a small bruise, but not bleeding. Her lip was a little puffy, but if you didn't look closely you wouldn't notice. Her head ached, her shoulders ached and more than anything her heart ached. Her chest was heavy, as if filled with tears that wouldn't come. Looking at her face once more in the mirror, she held her hands out in front of her. There were four half moon shaped lacerations on her left forearm, but thankfully no bruise. The left wrist was swollen, and it looked a little crooked. She opened and closed her wrist a few times, wincing at the effort. Sighing, she turned, grabbed her coat and bag and headed out the door, files and takeout still sitting on the table. 'One good thing about not having anyone,' she thought, 'is not having to explain yourself to anyone.'


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Olivia spent the rest of the night sitting on her couch staring into space, her left wrist ensconced in black fiberglass and resting on her knee. Every now and then she would move and the heavy weight and tenderness would pull her out of the trance. She truly felt unable to move, to sleep, to do anything but sit and try and evaluate what had happened that day. Elliot had hurt her.

He had hit her.

And she let him.

She let him.

She let him.

She couldn't stop running the incident over and over through her mind. She saw herself slap Elliot after hearing those words, she saw his hand come up and saw herself unmoving, not reacting, not reacting the second time, nor trying to escape the death grip he held on her wrist. She could hear his angry words in her mind. She clenched her right hand in and out of a fist, clenched her arms and legs, her abdominal muscles. She was strong, she was fit, she didn't know why she hadn't fought back. Elliot was strong, but not that strong, and he wasn't really aware of what he had been doing; she had been. She was faster than him, she knew that. She heard the words he had said on endless repeat in her mind. "Shut up. You don't have _anyone_. Drunken mother. Rapist father. What do you know?"

Nothing she had ever felt hurt as bad as those words coming from his mouth. He was her _partner._ Her _friend._ He knew how much those words would hurt her, hell, he knew everything about her and he still let those thoughts come out of his mouth. She sighed and hung her head. She had long ago stopped caring what most people thought or said about her, years of living with her mother had taught her that. But this was different. This was Elliot. He had been her rock, someone she could always depend on. She definitely cared what he thought. And now she knew. She thought back involuntarily to the good times they had shared, joking about a case, about each other, sharing takeout. Those memories were bitter now, only making her current heartache worse.

Olivia sat on her couch throughout the night, not sleeping. She must have dozed off for a few minutes, because the next thing she knew it was not quite so dark in her apartment. The city was waking up. She pulled herself further down on the couch and closed her eyes, blissfully sinking into a light, restless sleep. She awoke to the sound of her cellphone buzzing on the table in front of her. She looked at the clock, 8:25. She was supposed to have been at work a half hour ago. She looked at the caller ID on the phone. Elliot.

She set the phone back down on the coffee table and let it go to voicemail. Sitting up on the couch with her elbows on her knees, she let her head hang forward. She felt hung over. She grimaced. If she was going to feel so awful, she should at least have gotten to bury some of the hurt with alcohol.

She heard the phone beep telling her Elliot had left a message. Ignoring it, she dialed the Captain. He was concerned about her, he said, but more than happy to grant a day off for the first time in who knew how long. She reassured him at least 5 times that she was fine, then looked at her wrist. How was she going to explain that? She told him she wasn't sick, she just needed a day off. Knowing she wasn't going to get any peace of mind sitting on the couch, she moved on autopilot, throwing out the uneaten takeout from the night before, cleaning her apartment. When she couldn't think of anything else to do, (her apartment wasn't that big afterall,,,It only took so long to clean 600 sq ft) she pulled out some workout clothes and runners and contemplated a run in the park. Looking outside, the glare of the sun on the buildings made her blink. It was sunny and clear, but frigid, well below freezing. Well, it wouldn't be the first time she'd run in the cold. Pulling out an extra set of earmuffs and gloves and an extra layer of fleece, she shoved her phone and keys in her pocket. She glanced at the mirror in her hallway on her way out. 'Bonus, the earmuffs covered the stitch an overeager intern had insisted on putting in under her eye, promising it would leave less of a scar.'

On her way out of the building, she waved to her doorman, who waved back, warning her not to slip on the ice or get too cold. She pulled her fleece over her mouth and nose to protect it from the icy air and started a slow jog towards the park.

Back at the precinct, the day was going on as usual. No one was taking Olivia's absence too seriously, except Elliot. He'd called her once in the morning and gotten only her voicemail. He was stomping around the room and generally being unpleasant to everyone. By the third time he'd snapped at Munch for asking a basic question, the older, skinner detective snapped back.

"Look, Stabler, just because you have your panties in a twist because you and your partner got into a little tiff, doesn't mean you have to take it out on us. Take it out on her if your pissed at her." At that, Elliot slammed shut the folders he was half-heartedly looking at and climbed the stairs to the cribs two at a time.

"Phhewww," Fin exclaimed through his teeth. Munch looked at him expectantly, as if to say 'what'd I do?' "I think that was the problem to begin with, man. He took it out on her." Munch turned and looked at his colleague on the stairs. He shrugged, "How was I supposed to know? How do you always know exactly what's going on around here?"

"Perception, man. I pay attention, it's not that hard," Fin replied.

"Hmphh," said Munch, making a face of concern. "Think Liv's okay?"

"Benson? Yeah, she can handle Stabler, she can give it as good as he can. One of the few who have ever be able to handle him," Fin replied.

"Yeah, well, one day one of them is going to cross the line. I have a feeling Liv will be on the wrong side of that argument," Munch stated prophetically.

Upstairs in the silence of the dark cribs, Elliot pulled out his phone and dialed Olivia's number. It went straight to voicemail. He then called her home number. No one else had her home number, he only knew it because he'd given it to the multitudes of takeout places. No answer on that line too. Either she was out, screening her calls, or both. Not being able to be alone with his thoughts, or rather his memory, he jogged down the stairs, grabbed his coat and hurried out the door, throwing a half-assed "Cover for me" towards Fin and Munch.

"Not likely" Fin snorted, but when the Captain came looking for him, Fin looked up and told him Elliot had just left to grab some coffee, blaming it on the notorious poor quality of Munch's brew.

Outside in the cold, Elliot drove the few blocks to Olivia's apartment. Standing outside her building, he hit the buzzer repeatedly without response. Finally the old doorman came and opened the interior door for him. "She isn't home, stop bothering the rest of us, Detective," the old man told him pointedly. He'd worked at the building as long as Elliot had known Olivia. Seeing Elliot's crestfallen face, he mentioned "I told her it was too cold for a run, but she's not gonna listen to anybody, so off she went..." The elderly man gestured outside toward the park.

"She went for a run? In this weather? Elliot asked eagerly.

"That's what I said, but yeah, I think she did. Headed towards the park. Crazy, right?"

"Absolutely," Elliot replied with a grin, fist hitting the counter. "Thanks, man." He turned out of the building and walked as fast as he could towards Central Park. He drove uptown the few blocks, parked in a loading zone on Central Park West and made his way to the southwest edge of the loop. He knew where she usually ran and he figured he could catch her on her way back down. Pulling his coat a little closer and rubbing his hands, he leaned up against the fence post; he was too cold to sit. He was rewarded for his efforts. In less than 5 minutes he saw a familiar figure running along the path towards him. He recognized her before he could even identify her features. He knew how she moved; he'd recognize that stride anywhere.

Olivia felt her lungs burning as she rounded the last corner. It was only a couple miles but the frigid air wasn't helping. She was a cop, it was her instinct to be fully aware of her surroundings at all time, so when she heard Elliot call at her from his post along the benches, she wasn't surprised. She'd seen him there. She also didn't respond. Pretending she hadn't heard him, she pumped up her music a little louder as she followed the road East again, swearing at him inwardly for making her take a second lap.

Seeing that she hadn't heard him, Elliot jogged towards her calling again, matching her stride even as he was dressed in street clothes and shoes. She looked over at him and met his eye, but didn't slow her pace. "What do you want, Elliot, I'm on vacation." She said it more like a statement than a question.

"I just wanted to...I needed to see, to say..." He stumbled as he realized he really didn't know what he needed to say.

"Well, hurry it up, I've got one more lap and it's cold," she replied, voice as cold as the air. She picked up her pace. Elliot struggled beside her in his work shoes, slipping on the ice. He moved over to the edge of the road where the ice was tempered with the dirt and leaves and was much less treacherous. Now on her left side, he tried to match her new pace.

"Olivia, can you stop for a minute?" he said, exasperated. He reached out and grabbed her forearm, trying to get her to turn towards him. He felt his hand hit the plaster of the cast he hadn't known she had. An involuntary hiss escaped her mouth. He almost lost his balance in shock as surprise as she increased her pace yet again.

"Keep up or go home, Stabler," she tossed over her shoulder, leaving him in the middle of the path. A horse drawn carriage with some tourists covered in blankets and another runner passed him as he stood there. Turning around, he settled himself back at the post where he knew she would turn towards her apartment after the second loop.

He waited. Another 30 minutes went by. He knew the loop was only 2 miles long, at her pace she should have been by at least 15 minutes ago. Even if she had taken the longer loop to the reservoir she would've passed by again. Chilled to the bone and convinced he had missed her, he admitted defeat and headed back towards the precinct. Halfway there he had a change of heart and headed back towards her apartment for one last chance. He had two texts on his phone from Fin telling him to get his ass back to the precinct before the Captain asked more questions he couldn't answer. Caling Fin and telling him he'd be 5 minutes, he hung up the phone and swung into the loading zone in front of Olivia's apartment again.

Halfway through her second lap, Olivia's lungs and nose were burning. She swore at Stabler under her breath. What was he doing, _trying_ to torture her? At the 72nd St crossover she made a split second decision and exited the park, heading back towards her apartment on the city streets. She had a feeling Elliot was still waiting for her in the park and she didn't feel like indulging him a second time. She was mad, and hurt, and she wasn't going to take it just to assuage his guilt. Not this time.

Feeling the heat of her apartment building, she grinned at the doorman. "Glad to see you survived, Miss. It's too cold out to voluntarily be outside."

"Ah, come on, Joe. It'll put hair on your chest," she joshed with him as she pulled on her gloves and fumbled for her keys.

"That may be, but it's still too cold for reasonable people. Oh, Miss Benson, your partner stopped by. I told him you'd gone for a run. Did he find you? "

She smiled, 'bless that man, always looking out for her even when she didn't want him too,' she thought. "He did, Joe, thanks. Hey, if he or anyone else from my work stops by, tell them I don't want to be disturbed please?"

"Sure, no problem, Miss. Everything okay?" he asked, a little suspicious of such a request.

"Yep, no problem, just trying to take a break from work, need some time off," she replied with a smile, hoping he would buy it.

He didn't, but he was polite enough to pretend. "Okay then, no visitors for you."

"Thanks," she called as she climbed the stairs, lungs thanking her for the warm air.

Not more than 10 minutes past before Elliot was pulling up in front of her building. Joe meeting him at the door, Elliot asked. "She home yet?"

"Yes sir, but she asked me not to let anyone up," Joe replied.

"What do you mean?" Elliot asked, stopping in his tracks.

"Well, sir, she told me not to let anyone from her work upstairs and not to buzz her, she said she was on vacation. That's kind of the point of having a doorman, right?" The old man nodded at him.

"Uh, yeah, right. Well, I guess I'll call her later." Elliot said, turning back towards his car. He wasn't going to try and get past the doorman, it would be humiliating for all of them if he showed up at her door after she'd given express wishes to be alone.

He swung by the coffee shop so at least he'd have some semblance of a reason for being gone for an hour. Luckily, it seemed the Captain had been occupied. Later that afternoon he'd walked by Elliot's desk and slapped a note with tomorrow's date, a time and an address in front of him. He recognized the address as Huang's. He nodded at his boss and went back to work.

Back at her apartment, Olivia cleaned up, forgetting how difficult things were when you had to do them one handed. At least she was right handed. She spent the rest of the day not doing much more than moping, she pulled out a book, a magazine, an old movie, none of which distracted her for any significant amount of time. She thought about returned to work the next day, planned it out in her head so she would have a response ready for every possible comment. She had a story for the cast for Cragen and the other, had a line complaining about the 10 days of desk work it was going to require, a line in response to getting a hard time for taking a day off and still managing to hurt herself. The only thing she didn't have a response for was Elliot.

Her face burned everytime she thought of their 'fight' as she thought of it, although she had done very little of the fighting. Cragen had sent her a message last night telling her Elliot had agreed to talk to Huang. That was something. She was sure _he'd_ get through whatever had been crawling up his rear but she wasn't yet sure _she_ would. Realizing she hadn't eaten anything all day and feeling a dehydration headache coming on, she made some tea and found a can of soup in the kitchen. She lost interest halfway through the soup and tossed the rest down the sink.

She finally decided that she was mortified to see her partner. She was embarrassed by what he had said, and what he had done, what she had allowed him to do. Well, embarrassment was something she knew how to deal with. Those other emotions, the fear, hopelessness and sadness, those were more complicated. But shame? She had no problem dealing with shame, she'd been doing that her whole life.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Making sure she arrived early the next morning, she'd talked to the Captain and ensconced herself at her desk with her coffee before the others arrived. She'd taking the single stitch out herself this morning, leaving only a small mark that she didn't think anyone would notice with her bangs down. Taking the expected and deserved comments about being well-rested and taking time off, she girded herself for the comments about having to ride a desk. Luckily the Captain told everyone for her as he was briefing them on the case being sent over from homicide. "Now that Benson used her vacation to dislocate her wrist, I'm down a detective on the streets. Sorry guys, you guys are up," he said, handing the files to Elliot and Fin.

"What'd you do, Liv? Can't even handle a relaxing day off, what was so exciting that you had to break a bone?" Munch ribbed good-naturedly.

"Hardly exciting, John. I slipped on the ice running in the park. And it's not broken, was just dislocated, they fixed it." She turned the wrist back and forth in the cast as if to prove a point.

Elliot's ears perked up. 'Fell running the park yesterday? She was lying. She'd already had the cast by that point. Why was she lying?' He had a sudden memory flash of her looking at him with shock, pain in her brown eyes. His hand was around her left wrist. He gasped almost audibly, his stomach hit the floor. He suddenly felt almost lightheaded. Remembering his appointment with Huang scheduled for this afternoon, he grabbed Fin and practically pushed him out the door. He couldn't stand to be in the same room as Olivia, so great was his shame.

She was lying to protect him. He deserved to be thrown under a bus and she was protecting him. Things in his memory were starting to fall into place, but he was deliberately keeping from thinking about it, knowing it would be the end of him. He had to keep busy.

Olivia, always aware of what her partner was doing, almost thinking even, noticed his reaction to her lie. He knew she was lying. He could tell she didn't want anyone to know she'd stood there and let someone destroy her completely, emotionally, if not physically. No wonder he couldn't stand to be around her, he was as embarrassed by her actions as he was. His partner couldn't even fight back, couldn't even defend herself, much less him. She turned back to the computer and pounded the keyboard viciously.

Getting up to get a refill on the coffee, she sighed as she fumbled with the sugar packet. John, helpful as ever, opened the packet for her and poured the coffee as she held the cup in her one good hand. He looked at her discreetly as she stirred the coffee. Something was off, he just couldn't put his finger on it. "So, what's up with your partner? What crawled up his ass and died, making life miserable for the rest of us mere mortals?" he asked.

She looked at him, almost even in height. "You know, John, I have no idea. For the first time, I had no idea what the hell is going through his mind." 'Oh, she knew some of it,' she thought. She knew what he thought of her, but she wasn't sure what had made him say those things in the first place.

Across town at the crime scene, Fin and Elliot were wrapping things up as the CSU team was finishing off the details. Looking at his watch and realizing he had only 15 minutes to get across town, he snapped off his gloves and asked Fin, "Can you finish up here? I've got a place a need to be. Cap knows."

"Uh, yeah, sure," Fin mumbled in reply. Seriously, when were Benson and Stabler not causing drama? He wished they would just suck it up and do their job, purposefully not remembering his own share of the drama he'd had in the past few years.

Elliot grabbed a cab towards the Westside, coming to a building he'd been to one other time, during the Gitano case. This time was different, this time he was under duress. He approached the apartment door and silently hoped that his knock went unanswered. His hopes were dashed when the door opened right away. Dr. Huang opened the door for him, welcomed him in, offered him some coffee or tea or water, which he declined, just wanting to get it over with.

"So, Elliot, how come you are here?" the doctor asked.

"Because I am being forced to come here, though I am sure you know that already," Elliot replied.

"Yes, I know. But what I really want to know is why YOU think you are here."

"Because they made me."

"They didn't give you a choice?"

"No."

"Are you sure?"

"The choice was come get my head shrunk or force my partner to quit."

"Ah, so you chose to come here rather than see Detective Benson leave."

"N-, well, yeah, I guess."

"Why?"

"Because she shouldn't have to quit because of me."

"Why would you be forcing your partner to do anything? Doesn't she have a choice?"

"She said…"

"I know what she said. Why do you think you would be forcing her to?"

"Because it would be because of me, that is the only reason she would leave."

"Is your job easy, Elliot?"

"What does that mean? Of course it's not easy, we see the filth, the worst of the worst harming the innocent. Of course it's not easy, sometimes its torture."

"So why do you assume that the only reason Olivia would quit would be because of you? A bit narcissistic isn't it? To assume that another person's actions are solely because of what you do or don't do?"

He turned to a slightly different topic. "Why would Olivia insist you get therapy?

"I dunno, to get back at me," he said half sarcastically, half angrily.

"Get back at you for what?" Huang replied, baiting him a little for his comment.

"She tried to get me to talk to her and I wouldn't, so this was her next option."

Huang went on. "Elliot, did something happen between you and Olivia?"

His head sprung up. What do you mean? What did Cragen say?

"Cragen didn't say anything, only that he thought something had gone wrong between you two, but he didn't know what." Inwardly, Huang was preparing himself to hear about a forbidden love affair, a momentary indiscretion, the way Cragen had implied it. He was not expecting the admission that he got.

"We had a…. I said some things. I said some horrible things to her. Things that were not true, should never have been said aloud and things that can never be taken back."

"What did you say?"

Elliot just shook his head. "I accused her of the things that I knew would hurt her the most, that I knew she was afraid of. And…And…I think I did it on purpose. And if that wasn't bad enough, I…"

Huang looked at the man in front of him, he was almost choking on his sobs. "Why would you say such things? You care for Liv, as a friend, as your partner?"

"I don't know. I was angry, I was angry at my wife, at myself, and I took it out on her." His voice was full of anguish.

"Why her?"

"Because she was there, she was trying to help."

"Help with what?"

Elliot found himself telling the doctor about his wife, their marriage, her threat to take his children and leave and how powerless it made him feel.

"You felt weak, like a failure as a husband because of the things Kathy said. Then here comes Olivia, who has never had all of those things. Do you think you turned on her because it made you feel like less of a failure. Despite all your problems, you still had more than she did and in some sick sense you thought you would feel better if you rubbed that in."

Elliot sat across from him, head in his hands. "No! Maybe…" he said softly. "But it didn't work. Now I am a failure as a husband, as a father, as a cop and as a partner and especially as a friend. I tried to protect what little I had left and ending up losing everything."

"Elliot, everything is not lost. You told me you and Kathy talked, are working things through, your children still love you, you decided to take corrective steps to continue to be successful at your job."

"Yes, but I've ruined my partnership. And my friendship. She's not going to get over that. I hurt her, and I hurt her on purpose. I slapped her! I hurt her! She looked at me like she was afraid. Olivia! Afraid. Of me. She isn't afraid of anything!" The doctor tried to cover his shock at that admission. He wasn't expecting violence, not between those two detectives. Luckily for Elliot, he was too wrapped up in his thoughts and didn't notice the look on Huang's face. "Olivia's no fool, she won't put up with that. We're done for."

Huang was calculating in his mind at a frantic rate. That was an issue that they would have to deal with, have to come back to because now was not the time, it was too heady, too fresh.

"Why do you think she insisted you go to therapy? She could have just quit if she didn't want to work with you, or requested a new partner. She'd done it before.

"I dunno."

"Don't you, Elliot?"

"I guess she thought I couldn't handle myself."

"And was she right?"

"Yeah. " Elliot replied, thinking of the words he'd said, the uncontrolled anger with which he had said them. 'My god, what if his anger had been unleashed in front of his children?' "She was." He sat looking at his hands, imagining them slapping one of his children, his little son and then without meaning to he saw his hand gripping Olivia's wrist, heard her take a breath when she saw his hand come to slap her a second time, heard her let out the breath and brace for the slap. Her head swung to the side and she left it there, avoiding eye contact with him. He heard her gasp a little as he felt something in her wrist pop. Then she was gone, pulled away and ducked under his arm.

"Why didn't she fight back, Doc?" he asked after a few minutes of silence.

"Why didn't who fight back?" the doctor replied.

"Olivia. She didn't fight back, didn't yell, didn't take a swing at me. She's got a terrific hook, she knows all my dirty secrets as well as I know hers. She could have fought back physically, or verbally, but she didn't. Why not?"

"Why do you think she didn't, Elliot?" The doctor turned it back on him. Elliot sat and stared at his hands some more, not replying. After a few more minutes, Huang stood and moved towards the kitchen. Returning to the living room and seeing Stabler unmoved from his position on the couch, he touched the man's shoulder.

"Tomorrow? Same time?"

"Uh, yeah, sure." Elliot left the building, called his boss and told him he was heading home and got his assent.

That night Olivia left work at a reasonable hour. The one and only benefit of being stuck at a desk is that there was rarely a reason to stay late. Of course, this being a time when she desperately needed to stay busy, she had plenty of time off.

Heading straight home, not bothering to pick up anything for dinner, she considered her day. She hadn't seen or talked with Elliot at all. Best way to handle this, she thought, was just to pretend nothing had happened. She wouldn't have to face her embarrassment and he hopefully wouldn't bring it up.

As the days past, Elliot and Olivia slowly regained their working relationship but not the closeness that made them so good at their job. She didn't share anything with him and he didn't push her. He found her even-keeled and behaving as if nothing had happened; Elliot went along with it. He'd continued his sessions with Huang, twice a week for the foreseeable future and as much as he hated to admit it, they were helping. Things looks better at home and better at work, with the exception of his relationship with his partner. Huang had not brought her up. He'd worked through most of that day, their fight. The only thing he still didn't understand is why Olivia hadn't fought back.

Olivia's cast came off 10 days later. Relieved to be back on active duty, she fell back into a more regular routine. Working her erratic, but routine for her, hours. She was sleeping poorly and drinking more coffee and didn't have much appetite, but she was happy to be back working. She just wasn't happy to be home. She found herself skipping meals while by herself. It just didn't seem worth the effort when it was just her. She ran, or went to the gym and grabbed a snack. She ate all she wanted when she was with others, but when left on her own she felt herself sliding into complacency. Truth be told, she wasn't really bothered by it. By the end of the third week after the fight, she could tell she'd lost some weight, her clothes fit differently. She shrugged it off and told herself to take better care of herself. But that night, again, she wandered home late, ran in the park and went to bed without eating. One more meal wouldn't matter, plus the sandwich she'd had for lunch had been more than enough for one meal.

In the end, it was a case from work that shook her from her stupor, just as those at work were starting to wonder about the weight loss. She hadn't had much to extra weight to lose, but she'd always had some curves. Those were quickly losing their shape. The call had come in mid-day, a woman had called the police reporting getting beaten up and then had called to retract her complaint. The uniforms had already been dispatched and the site they'd found coupled with the woman's insistence that they leave had led one of the rookies to call SVU to see what they could do.

Elliot had been in court all day testifying for a rape case, so Fin and Olivia had taken the call. The woman was shaken, but determined to be rid of the detectives. She had clearly been beaten. She had a black eye, three stitches over her cheekbone, a broken tooth, a swollen lip and bruising on her arms and neck that looked like fingerprints. She'd denied being raped, said she just gotten hit a few times. Seeing that a male detective wasn't going to make as much headway as a sympathetic female ear, Fin slipped away into the back room as Olivia talked with the victim. She repeated the events, the words, the actions of her husband, the man who was supposed to love her.

"Why did you stay, when he's done this to you before? You have a good job, you have money, what made you stay? Olivia asked, both out of curiosity and because she needed to know if there were threats.

"That day? Or in general?" The woman shrugged and went on without an answer. "I don't know really. I don't know why I didn't run yesterday, there was nothing to stop me. He wasn't holding me anymore, just stood there with his hand up as if he was waiting to hit me. I guess I thought….I guess…."

"Go on," Olivia encouraged her.

"I guess I thought that he was my husband, he was my best friend. If he could say nasty things about me, and hit me because of it, then it was probably true. I thought that if he, of all people, thought I needed to be hit, then I probably deserved it." She hung her head. "Crazy, right?"

"No, honey" Olivia replied in a choked, thin voice. "You're not crazy. Incorrect, yes, but not crazy. People use violence in a lot of ways, the main one as a form of control. You NEVER deserve such treatment, no one has the right to do that to you, understand?"

The younger woman nodded and listened to Olivia explain the process. Yes, she had a place to stay, no she didn't fear for her life at this time, etc.

After wrapping up the details, Fin and Olivia headed back to their car. Olivia was uncharacteristically quiet. Fin looked at her. Her cheek bones were a little more prominent, but she looked good, just preoccupied. She was running what the woman had said over and over in her mind, as if it was a hard candy to be savored.

The conclusion she reached was the same every time and it made her a little sick to acknowledge it. She had stood there and let Elliot say those things about her, accuse her and dredge up her past. She had let him slap her twice and squeeze her wrist hard enough to dislocate it. He had done all of those things and she hadn't run.

She hadn't run because she had believed him. She hadn't hit back because she believed him. She believed she truly was all of those things, she was alone because she deserved to be, she didn't know how to have true relationships, she was the wicked spawn of a drunken mother and a violent father and if he thought she should be slapped for it, then he, who knew all her secrets and knew her better than anyone, was right.

Sitting in the passenger seat quietly running this through her mind, she began to feel sick. Speaking up suddenly, she told Fin she wasn't feeling well and asked him to drop her off at her apartment.

He looked at her again through squinted eyes and said "Yeah, of course. You allright, Liv?" Whereas during his first investigation she had looked well, with color in her cheeks, now she looked pale, almost green and was shrugged down into the seat. He figured it must be some weird bug, to come on so fast for no reason. He pulled to a stop and barely had the car into park before Olivia was halfway out the door. She stood grabbing her keys and waved him off, giving him the signal that she would call him later. As he drove off, she turned into the small alley between her building and it's neighbor and promptly vomited her lunch onto the ground.


	4. Chapter 4

Slap: Chapter 4

_The conclusion she reached was the same every time and it made her a little sick to acknowledge it. She had stood there and let Elliot say those things about her, accuse her and dredge up her past. She had let him slap her twice and squeeze her wrist hard enough to dislocate it. He had done all of those things and she hadn't run. _

_She hadn't run because she had believed him. She hadn't hit back because she believed him. She believed she truly was all of those things, she was alone because she deserved to be, she didn't know how to have true relationships, she was the wicked spawn of a drunken mother and a violent father and if he thought she should be slapped for it, then he, who knew all her secrets and knew her better than anyone, was right. _

_Sitting in the passenger seat quietly running this through her mind, she began to feel sick. Speaking up suddenly, she told Fin she wasn't feeling well and asked him to drop her off at her apartment. _

_He looked at her again through squinted eyes and said "Yeah, of course. You allright, Liv?" Whereas during his first investigation she had looked well, with color in her cheeks, now she looked pale, almost green and was shrugged down into the seat. He figured it must be some weird bug, to come on so fast for no reason. He pulled to a stop and barely had the car into park before Olivia was halfway out the door. She stood grabbing her keys and waved him off, giving him the signal that she would call him later. As he drove off, she turned into the small alley between her building and it's neighbor and promptly vomited her lunch onto the ground. _

Still bending over in the alley, Olivia spit twice trying to clear the taste of vomit from her mouth. She rubbed the tears leaking from her eyes and ran into her building. Ignoring the doorman who waved at her, she ran up the 3 flights of stairs. Out of breath, she fumbled for the keys and hurried inside her apartment, slamming the door behind her as she sunk down to the floor, knees bent in front of her. She could feel the panic in her chest.

'Shit.' She thought. 'Shit. Shit. Shit.' Now what was she going to do. She couldn't go back to work with him. She was so angry, still so hurt, but mostly now she was fuming. He had crossed a line, he had not only crossed it he had run over it full speed ahead. He had dumped on her and now they were broken. Permanently. She felt her chest heaving, tears of anger and grief rushing to her eyes. She was pulled out of it by the ringing of her phone. Caller ID told her it was her boss. Fin must have gotten back to the station and told him of her flame out. She answered the phone, knowing she'd have to answer eventually.

"Benson."

"Olivia, are you allright? What's going on?" The voice on the other end barked at her. "Now is not the time, we have a pile of open cases here."

"I know, Cap. I'm sorry, I think it was something that I ate, I've been puking all afternoon." Well, at least that last bit was mostly true. All she knew at this point was that there was no way that she could go back into work today, not when there was a chance she could see _him. _She'd take the night and figure out what she was going to do.

On the other end of the line, she heard her boss say "Fine, feel better," and then she heard the click.

Back at the station, Elliot had returned from court and was sorting out his messy desk. Fin and Much were making phone calls about their open cases. Cragen came out of his office and walked to Fin's desk. "Was Liv okay when you dropped her off?"

Fin tilted his head, half giving it a shake. "She was okay at the Emerson place and we got in the car and she just turned green, looked pretty bad. Sad she just needed to go home, so I dropped her off. It wasn't too far out of the way. I didn't want her puking in the car, man, and she looked like she was about to…" He shrugged his shoulder again. "Why? She okay?"

"Says she is, she'll be back tomorrow."

Overhearing part of their conversation, Elliot inserted himself into the conversation, "Why, what happened to Benson?"

"Went home sick, Fin said she almost puked in the sedan," Cragen said. "Elliot, can I talk to you in my office. Now please." It was not a question.

Elliot turned and followed the older man. Reaching the office, Cragen closed the door. Elliot thought he'd been in this same situation far too often recently. "So," Cragen spoke, "Any idea what's going on with your partner? She's taken more voluntary sick days this month than in the previous 8 years. She okay as far as you know?"

Elliot swallowed, thinking back involuntarily to his hand hitting her face. 'You don't have _anything_,' his angry voice saying.

"No, things have been fine lately, as far as I know," he lied. Things had been 'fine' but they certainly hadn't been 'good' or 'right' between them. That was not something he was going to talk to his Captain about. Not when he was already being forced to see a shrink.

Cragen sighed. "Fine," he said, dismissing Elliot with a wave. "Get back to work, we're down a man. I need you out there."

Inside her quiet apartment, Olivia still sat on the floor, back against her apartment door. Her eyes were dry, but her chest was still heaving, as if she was crying without the tears. She could still taste the bitter aftertaste of vomit in the back of her throat. She pulled herself up, found a bottle of scotch she had stored above the refrigerator, poured a generous two fingers into a glass and tossed it back. She hissed as the alcohol burned the back of her throat, settling into her empty stomach with a familiar burn. She poured another and took it over to the sofa where she sat, staring at her hands.

She didn't know how long she sat there, probably a couple of hours. She finally moved when she noticed her forearms going numb from leaning on her knees. She'd been toying with her options, turning each of them over and over in her mind repeatedly. She thought she had it sorted out.

She had three options: She could go back to work, pretend nothing was wrong, pretend she wasn't broken by her partners actions. She wouldn't be able to be his friend, he certainly wasn't hers, but she could fake the calm and get through the work days for a while.

Another option was to go into work now, or tomorrow morning and confront him, yell at him, punch him, scream at him, tell him all the things she should have told him that day but had been too afraid to, had been too busy believing him to say or do. She could tell him why she made him go to therapy. She could tell him she knew he was going to blow his stack, take it out on himself, or heaven-forbid his family; he had been losing control, she could see it and needed to do something about it. She could handle a strung-out Stabler, or so she had thought, but she knew his family couldn't and they were more important than her.

She thought about that a minute. After the incident in the locker room, a small part of her had known that whatever they had had was gone, was irreparably broken, but she knew that his family was still salvageable. They could keep going as they were and he could lose his family, or she could make him do something about it. He would lose her, but keep his family. She knew he was partially lost to her already, but the sacrifice of losing him altogether would be worth it if it saved his family. That was probably why she hadn't been eating properly, there just wasn't much point if that was the case, which, she realized now, it was.

Her third option was to leave, to transfer out, to get out now and put it all behind her. She'd had good reasons for being in SVU when she'd joined, had good reasons for staying for so many years. Those reasons had changed though. She didn't need to be there for her mother anymore. She'd proven to herself she could work that job; she didn't need to be there for herself anymore. And now she certainly didn't need to be there for her partner. Didn't want to be there _because_ of her partner. She thought about her options with the NYPD other than SVU. She was sure there were plenty. She had a good, mostly clean record, a few commendations. She'd be able to find someone to take her. Something better than Computer Crimes, she hoped. The last time she had transferred out it had been in a hurry and that was all they had open. She could wait it out for something good she thought, knowing if she left, she probably wouldn't be coming back a second time. She remembered the Captain at the Bronx SVU offering her a position if she ever wanted it, but she didn't really want to leave Manhattan.

Looking down at her still full drink, she tossed it back appreciating the burn again. She rubbed her shoulders, tight from sitting unmoving all afternoon. She thought she knew what she was going to do. It would probably end up being a combination of all of the above.

Stepping into the shower, she started to cry silently. She was letting herself grieve for what she had lost. She was crying for Elliot, knowing that they couldn't really be friends like they had been, for their lost friendship, for leaving her other colleagues, for Fin and Munch and the Captain. She cried through her anger at Elliot for putting her in this position, and for herself for being weak enough and damaged enough for it to even be an issue. She grieved for herself and her mother and all of the things she hadn't accomplished at SVU. When she had cried herself dry, she got out of the shower, dried off, wrapped herself in a towel and padded into the kitchen. She poured herself another drink and tossed it back with the careless familiarity of someone who did that often. She placed the glass in the sink and the bottle back into the cabinet. The hot shower and the booze together made her head fuzzy, made everything seem a little softer and further away. It was a welcome feeling.


	5. Chapter 5

**Sorry, this one's a little long and a little slow. Lot's of confrontation coming up. Elliot vs Olivia. Olivia vs Huang, Elliot vs Cragen, Elliot vs Munch. Elliot vs Huang, Olivia vs Elliot. Let me know if you have any specific requests on the way you want this to go…**

_Looking down at her still full drink, she tossed it back appreciating the burn again. She rubbed her shoulders, tight from sitting unmoving all afternoon. She thought she knew what she was going to do. It would probably end up being a combination of all of the above. _

_Stepping into the shower, she started to cry silently. She was letting herself grieve for what she had lost. She was crying for Elliot, knowing that they couldn't really be friends like they had been, for their lost friendship, for leaving her other colleagues, for Fin and Munch and the Captain. She cried through her anger at Elliot for putting her in this position, and for herself for being weak enough and damaged enough for it to even be an issue. She grieved for herself and her mother and all of the things she hadn't accomplished at SVU. When she had cried herself dry, she got out of the shower, dried off, wrapped herself in a towel and padded into the kitchen. She poured herself another drink and tossed it back with the careless familiarity of someone who did that often. She placed the glass in the sink and the bottle back into the cabinet. The hot shower and the booze together made her head fuzzy, made everything seem a little softer and further away. It was a welcome feeling. _

Slap: Chapter 5

She was up early the next morning after crashing early with all the booze the night before. She took her time getting ready for work and then organizing her desk, her files, making sure everything was copacetic before the other detectives arrived. She had settled on Option 1 for the time being, fully aware that it was a not a long-term solution. The week passed without any drama. She and Elliot spoke when necessary, were polite, went on calls together and worked the cases together, but they were not TOGETHER. The fell back into their normal patterns as Olivia tried desperately not to show that something was dreadfully wrong.

By the end of the week she was exhausted from the effort. She didn't think anyone else noticed, though Munch had been giving her LOOKS out of the corner of his eye. He'd been doing that since she'd showed up with her arm in a cast though, so she wasn't sure it was related. Fin went about his own business as usual and Cragen, for once, wasn't hovering. She'd been a little proud of how she'd handled the past week. She'd kept her temper under control, she'd not snapped at anyone, she'd managed to eat enough around her colleagues to keep them from getting suspicious. She still didn't feel like eating when left on her own, but that was fine with her. She didn't have an appetite anyway. She told herself it was the stress. She worked off the stress at the gym.

Little did she know, she wasn't as good of an actress as she thought. Everyone had noticed her slightly looser clothes, her cheekbones, the way she never smiled unless she thought someone was watching her. Munch had mentioned it once to Elliot, but he had shrugged and said he didn't know, that she seemed fine to him. Munch had sneered at him, disappointed in his friend for his lack of concern for someone who had, in the past, been a great source of his worry.

It was late on Friday afternoon, Munch and Fin had gone, Elliot was on his way out the door, coat in hand. "You leaving, Liv?" he asked.

She tried to control the flinch when she heard him use her nickname so casually. "Yeah, just finishing up. Don't wait." She waved him off. He accepted her response and headed home to his family. If she didn't think he was worth the effort to be mad at, he wasn't going to waste his time either.

Olivia closed the file she had been working on and started typing on her computer. She glanced up at the light on in the Captain's office. Everyone else was gone. This was as good a time as any. A few minutes later she hit print, folded the letter and placed it in an envelope. She walked slowly to the office, tapping the envelope nervously on the palm of one hand. She knocked and entered after his response.

She stood in the doorway, not sure what to do. Captain Cragen looked up at her. "Olivia, what can I do for you?" He studied her. She looked thin and tired. He knew something had been bothering her, but her performance at work continued to be superb, so he didn't really have a reason to haul her into his office.

She walked into the office slowly and took a seat in the chair he had gestured towards. She sat there for a moment, not saying anything. Cragen studied the papers he had been reading, giving her a moment before finally saying. "Have something to say, Detective or do you just enjoy the comfort of that chair?"

"Captain, I… I'm thinking about requesting a transfer," she said, glancing down at the envelope in her hand.

His head came up at once when he heard that. "A transfer? Are you sure?"

She nodded and spoke quietly. "I'm tired, Cap. I think I need a change, need to get out."

He nodded at her. He tried to think if there had been a case recently that had sent her over the edge but couldn't remember one, couldn't think of anything out of the ordinary recently. She an Elliot had a bit of a shake up a while back, but it wasn't any worse than anything else they'd gone through, as far as he knew. She'd laid down that ultimatum, but when Elliot had agreed to talk to the shrink it seemed to blow over.

"Are you tired of the job, Liv, or something, someone else?" He wasn't sure, but he was fairly confident Elliot Stabler had something to do with this. Either he was the cause or he wasn't helping her out.

She looked at him and considered his question. "I don't know, Don. I don't think it matters at this point, you know?"

He nodded at her again. "Where do you want to go?"

"I've thought a lot about that, I'm not really sure yet. The Bronx SVU has an opening, but I'm not sure I want to leave Manhattan. I was going to see what else is open, or going to be open. I didn't want to submit anything official until after I had spoken to you," she looked again at her hands.

The bald Captain considered the detective in front of him. She looked more than tired; she looked defeated. He'd always been concerned about her ability to cope with the harder parts of the job. He'd kept an eye out on the emotional state of all of his detectives when the cases got too rough. Somehow he had missed something here, something he hadn't been aware of, and he would put money on the fact that Elliot Stabler was involved.

He nodded at the envelope in her hands. "Don't give that to me until you are sure, Detective." She nodded silently.

He folded his hands and brought them to the desk, leaning forward. "Olivia, what happened between you and Elliot?"

Her head swung up and he saw flashes of anger in her eyes. 'Well, that got a reaction from her,' he thought. "And don't tell me nothing, Benson. Don't insult my intelligence when I am asking you straight out."

She sighed. She ran her hand though her dark hair, her eyes looked dark. She looked to the side, avoided eye contact with her boss, a man she greatly respected and whose respect she craved.

"We had an argument." She shook her head. "It doesn't really matter anymore. It's not really about him. We've had arguments before…" She looked to the side and bit her lip.

"Liv…" Cragen sighed as he looked at her, disappointed, not in what she was saying, but what she was not saying.

She was almost in a trance, not really focusing. "I slapped him and he slapped me back, but this isn't about that. I believed him, Captain, that's what this is about. It's not about anything that he did or said; it's about what I can and can't handle. And I can't handle myself any more."

"Benson!" he said sharply. "What the hell are you talking about?"

She looked up sharply. 'Shit,' she thought, 'what did she say?' This was affecting her more than she had thought, her stomach grumbled. It was almost 8 and she hadn't eaten since noon. "Nothing, Captain." She rose to leave. "You'll let me know about the openings?"

"Benson. Sit. Down." She sat.

"I think you better tell me what's been going on in my own stationhouse."

She didn't respond. "Benson…" His voice had a warning in the tone. "Are you telling me Stabler _slapped _you? You didn't really fall in the park, did you." That was a statement, not a question.

"Cap, do you really think this is about me getting _slapped_? Do you think I would just let him _slap_ me without him getting a swift kick in the balls. Christ, I would have his balls in a vice-lock before he knew which way was up if it was about that."

"That's what I always thought," her Captain replied, "but here you are, with an arm just out of a cast, telling me you want to transfer out. I remember what happened in my office last month. So what is it about, Liv? If he's lost it, you need to tell me, for his sake, for his family…."

"I think he's fine, Captain. That's why I threw down that ultimatum, so he would be okay. He's not the issue, I'm telling you."

"But you won't work with him anymore." It was another statement that was really a question. He was watching his detective's reaction closely. He could see her crumbling before his eyes. He wasn't sure he could handle this. He'd never been good with the softer emotions. Anger, wrath, frustration, yes, but this? Whatever was eating this woman alive? He didn't know how to handle this.

"No."

"What the hell did he do to you?" She didn't answer, but stood and walked to the door, strode out of the office, grabbed her coat without stopping and left the building, leaving her Captain calling her name in futility. Her turned and thought about what had just happened and then picked up the phone to make a couple of phone calls.

Olivia went home and opened her fridge to grab something to eat for dinner. Standing in from of the open refrigerator, she zoned out for a minute, replaying with dread the way she had handled herself in her Captain's office. She slammed the door and went into her bedroom to change. It was dark, but she figured there would still be people in the park. Six miles at a 7-minute pace would take care of her nerves.

The weekend passed without incident. She'd worked her shift on Sunday with Fin; it went off without a hitch. Monday morning she was at her desk before the others, fresh coffee in the pot. Sipping hers contemplatively, she waved at the others as they walked him. Elliot said hello; she waved without saying anything.

Midway through the morning, Cragen stuck his head out of his office. "Benson, a word please."

In his office, he tore off a piece of paper from the notepad on his desk and handed it to Benson. "I made some calls." It was a list of open detective positions. "I'm going to need that back, most of those haven't been posted yet; I called a few friends and asked what they had in the wings."

Olivia considered the list, eyebrows raised. This was more help than she was expecting after what had happened on Friday.

"Ah, thank you Captain. I wasn't expecting…" her voice trailed off.

"Expecting what? Me to help? I figured you're already lost to me as a detective, I should at least try and make sure you land in a good spot. See anything you like there?"

She considered the list again. "Something in Manhattan. Homicide – the 0-9, or maybe Major Cases, the 2-7." She said, handing the list back to him.

"You still sure about this?" he asked her.

She hugged her arms around her middle and looked over her shoulder back out at her colleagues in the bullpen. "Yeah, I'm sure," she said sadly.

"I'll make some calls."

"Thanks, Cap." She left his office and walked back to her desk slowly.

Elliot looked up at her. "Everything okay?"

"Yeah," she said distantly. "Everything's fine."

Sitting at her desk, her head pounding, Olivia tried to focus on what she was reading. Unbeknownst to her, Munch was eyeing her from his desk, watching her leg bounce up and down as she massaged her temple. He noticed her defined cheekbones, the new cuts in the muscles of her upper arms, the way her pants, previously hugging her hips now hung on her hipbones, pulled down slightly by her weapon on her belt.

Suddenly he stood up, "I'm grabbing sandwiches, what do you guys want?" He wrote down orders for the rest of the squad and frowned when Olivia gently refused his offer. Not wanting to start a fight in the middle of the bullpen, he shoved the paper with the orders in his pocket and gave Elliot a glare, as if it was his fault she didn't want a sandwich. Elliot looked up at him in surprise.

Elliot sat, neglecting his own paperwork. He looked out the window; the sky was still dark and pouring rain. 'What the hell was wrong with Munch that going out for sandwiches now?' he wondered. Thinking about the glare the older detective had given him, he looked at his partner. He'd taken a huge step back from her the past few weeks. He'd half expected his partner to not allow this, expected her to confront him about it. He'd been doing a lot of soul searching and self-contemplation with Huang. Hell, he should've sat down with someone years before. He still couldn't get his mind around what had happened that day. He got up and walked up to the cribs to think for a minute in the dark and quiet. Head hanging, knees on his shoulders, he remembered their fight. He remembered the things he had said to her. He had no memory of her face, the look she'd had when she heard those devastating words. He knew she slapped him, but he didn't remember that in his black rage. He did remember slapping her twice, and the grip he'd held on her wrist, not wanting to let her go. He knew he had damaged her, damaged them, that day. He knew they needed to hash it out, needed to talk about it, but he, simply, was afraid. He was afraid of the things she would say, the things she would admit. He was terrified that if they brought up that day, they would lose what little relationship they still had. He sighed again. The past few weeks had been like living underwater. He felt he couldn't breathe sometimes. He missed his partner, his friend, but she was keeping her distance and after what he had done, he let her. He felt grateful that she was still speaking with him, working with him at all, grateful that she let him pick up a coffee, drive the sedan with both of them in it, the little things. He was grateful for that; he didn't deserve any more, in fact he deserved far less than what she was giving him. He was so sorry, he'd never been so sorry in his life.

He's spent the past few weeks being so sorry, he hadn't been paying attention to what was going on around him. Thinking back on the glare Munch had given him, he looked down from the top of the stairs at his partner. He hadn't looked at her in weeks. She had her hair down, tucked behind her ear. Something looked different. He looked at her face, focused on her paperwork, or so it seemed. Her left hand knuckled at her temple, her foot bounced up and down. His eyes moved from her jittery leg up to her hip, where her weapon hung off her belt, pulling her pants so it hung loosely off her hipbone. He noticed it jutting out a little bit. He'd never really considered Olivia's appearance. Well, he was a guy, he NOTICED her looks, of course. He had appreciated them more than just once or twice, but he never really thought about what she looked like. Now, staring down at her with her not knowing he was watching, he didn't like what he saw. His eyes pulled upwards and he took in her sinewy neck and sharp cheekbones. He frowned to himself. 'When the hell had that happened?' he asked himself. Somewhere else inside of him, a voice answered 'While you had your head up your ass worrying about what she thought of you.' He rubbed his hands over his face and jogged back down the stairs.

Just as he hit the bullpen, Munch walked in the door, water dripping from his coat and hat. He had an irritated look on his face as he began to divvy up the sandwiches. Walking over to Elliot's desk he ceremoniously dropped a turkey sub in front of him and then walked over to Olivia. He set the chicken salad sandwich he had been holding down on her desk, right on top of her paperwork. "What the…" she protested.

"Just eat it, Olivia. My treat." Munch told her with a pointed look.

She looked around for support from the others and didn't get any. She finally looked towards Elliot. He looked at her and said "Eat the sandwich, Benson." She gave him a dirty look as she unwrapped the sandwich.

Olivia peeled back the wrapper on the sandwich and took a bite. She was surprised at how good it tasted. Polishing it off in record time, she liked her fingers and looked up as she heard Elliot chuckle.

"Hungry after all?" he said. She smirked at him.

"You going to finish that?" he said, gesturing at his half eaten sub. He took the uneaten half and offered it to her. She took it, saying thanks, and taking a bite as she turned back to her paperwork. He sat as his desk baffled by her.

Olivia sat chewing the sandwich. She hadn't even noticed she was hungry. She made a mental note to thank Munch for the sandwich. She had a momentary pang of guilt when she thought about how her coworkers thought she needed looking after. For all intents and purposes she looked as if she was concentrating on her DD5, but dark thoughts were racing in her mind.

The past few weeks had almost destroyed her. It hurt every time she talked to Elliot, every time she looked at him. She missed him. No, she corrected herself, she missed the memory of him, the Elliot she had thought was her friend. Now she was sitting alone, in the dark. She thought about her apartment waiting for her to return to, cold and quiet. It never used to bother her, back when she thought she'd had friends at work. Since Elliot had let her know what he truly thought she dreaded the silence. It just reiterated all the things he had said to her. She was curious at his behavior towards her since then. He'd kept his distance, as if he too just realized what she was. There was a pit forming in her stomach. There was one more bite left of Elliot's sandwich. The appetite that had formally surprised her was gone. She crumpled the wrapper and dumped it in the trash.

She stood and walked quickly into the Captain's office. She asked if there was any update on her situation. He nodded at her and handed her an envelope. She looked curiously at him. He nodded at the envelope, wanting her to open it. She tore open the end and took out the papers inside. It was her completed transfer request, to Homicide at the 0-9. She read through the papers. "Monday?" she asked.

He nodded. "Problem?"

"No," she shook her head. "I just didn't think things would be resolved so quickly."

"Your reputation precedes you, Benson. More than one Captain was interested in snapping you up. "

She gave him a small smile and tapped the papers against one palm nervously. "I'd like to tell the guys myself," she said, leaving unsaid her request to keep things quiet.

"Of course. But I wouldn't take too long. Cops talk and I'm sure they know at the 0-9 already."

She nodded at him. He stood up to shake her hand and she left the office. She was eager and nervous and desperately sad all at the same time. She looked at the back of Stabler's head and swore at his again. 'Damn him. Things used to be so simple.' She absentmindedly rubbed her wrist.

Fin had been watching the interaction in the office. 'That did not look good,' he thought to himself. He knew something was about to go down. He didn't know what but he was sure he wasn't going to like it.


	6. Chapter 6

_Fin had been watching the interaction in the office. 'That did not look good,' he thought to himself. He knew something was about to go down. He didn't know what but he was sure he wasn't going to like it. _

Slap: Chapter 6

The week continued with the usual hectic pace of the SVU. Olivia barely had a chance to think about all the changes that were going to happen in the next week. She was grateful for that. By Thursday she was starting to worry that she would never get a chance to talk to the others. She'd spent a lot of hours worrying over who she would tell first and how. She decided on Fin.

Thursday afternoon they were all returning from the M.E.'s office where they'd gotten the run down on their new perp, a likely career criminal now escalating. She saw Fin head upstairs to the lockers and followed him up under the pretense of shedding her sweater.

"Fin, you gotta minute?" She asked him as she opened her locker but didn't take anything in or out.

"Sure, Benson, what's up?" He turned towards his female colleague.

She hesitated for a quick minute, then saw the dented locker out of the corner of her eye and she remembered why she was doing this in the first place.

"I wanted to let you know, I'm…ah….I'm transferring out. Got the papers earlier this week. Wanted to tell you before word got out." She spit this out fairly quickly, as if she didn't want the words to linger in case she chickened out and wanted to take them back.

"You're leaving?" he asked bluntly.

"Yes," she replied simply.

"How come?" he asked. Trust Fin to just blurt out whatever he was thinking, not tiptoeing around the issue.

"I just…I can't…" Now she was stumbling. "This just isn't the right place for me anymore. I can't do it anymore."

"What happened?" he asked again.

Olivia rubber her face. "Nothing happened. This place, these victims, they're just too much."

"Nah," he replied. "That's not it." He said it without any aggression, any defensiveness in his voice, as if he was simply stating a fact. He looked at her acutely.

"Does this have anything to do with why that locker has a huge dent in it?"

Her cheeks started burning. 'Damn him' she thought. She should've just left without saying anything. "No!" she said adamantly. "I just…"

He interrupted her. "Or maybe why you showed up in a cast 3 weeks ago, or why you've lost 20 pounds and put on an additional 5 pounds of muscle? Come on, Benson, we're not stupid. You don't need to tell us the details, but don't expect us to believe a stupid answer like nothing. Not after 10 years."

He paused and let her contemplate what he had said. She didn't reply, but looked down briefly before looking back up and meeting his eye.

He reached out and grabbed her on the shoulder, in a very awkward, brotherly fashion. "Hey, whatever you think you need to do. I'm not gonna pretend I understand, but you know that if you need us, we ALL will have your back. Just because one person let you down doesn't mean the rest of us have as well. "

She looked at him closely at that. He was hitting a little too close to home. "Yeah. Okay," she said quietly. He gave her shoulder one last squeeze and headed back downstairs.

She plopped down on the bench and stared at the locker in front of her without really seeing it. Her eyes were drawn to its neighbor with the large dent in the center. She sighed as she thought about how she had trusted Elliot with her heart, her soul, and he had punched right through it's center. Resolve steeled once again she walked downstairs and joined her colleagues at work.

Fin, as always, went about the day as if nothing was different, didn't treat her differently or say anything else to her.

She grabbed a spare moment when Elliot had gone upstairs to talk to Munch at the coffee machine. He was measuring out coffee grounds and filling the carafe when she approached him. "You know, I never understood how you could follow the instructions just like the rest of us, yet your coffee always tastes so horrible," she said to him.

"It's one of my many talents," he said snidely back. When she didn't move or say anything else he turned to her. "What's up, Benson."

She turned to face him and said quietly "I'm transferring out, John. I need to get out." She was not expecting the reaction that she got.

"What the hell, Benson! What the hell did he do to you?" he said angrily, eyes scanning the room for the cause of his ire.

"Nothing, John! Listen, it's not about him, not about that," she tried to get him to quiet down, not wanting attention from the other inhabitants of the squadroom.

"Like hell it isn't." He gave her one final look and stalked away, up the stairs. She realized where he was going 15 seconds later and jogged after him.

She caught up with him at the top of the stairs, just as Elliot was heading down.

"You asshole!" he yelled, getting in Stabler's face. If she hadn't been so pissed at the situation it almost would have been comical. "What the hell did you do to her?"

"What? I didn't… What are you talking about?"

"Oh, the hell you don't. What did you do that makes her flinch every time you make a sudden move around her?"

Elliot was stammering in front of the older detective, his normally calm affront rattled.

"What made her stop eating unless someone was watching her? Look at her, Stabler, she look normal to you? What'd you do? Threaten her? Hit her?"

"Look," Elliot interjected into his tirade. "It wasn't like that."

"Then what was it like? I'm pretty sure you just didn't take a swing at her like she was a beat cop that pissed you off. If you had, she would've kicked your ass, so what the hell did you do to make her leave? You take your anger out on her one too many times?"

Olivia's heart was pounding. This was NOT how this was supposed to happen, not in the middle of the squadroom. "Hey, this is not about me getting slapped would you guys keep it down!" She hissed at them, looking over her shoulder.

"Leave? What do you mean leave?" Elliot's eyes spun from Olivia to Munch and back. At the same time Fin, who had come up behind her said "Slapped, what do you mean slapped?

Olivia ran her hands through her hair. 'What a clusterfuck this was turning into, she thought. She shot a glaring look at Fin wanting him to drop it.

Fin pushed his way past Olivia closer to Elliot. "You need to start explaining, man," he said, getting a little into Elliot face.

John looked at her, slightly apologetic. "You hadn't told him yet?"

"No, I hadn't. Thank you very much." She started forward, pushing Elliot aside as she tried to make her way into the locker room.

"Olivia, what the hell is he talking about?" He reached out and lightly grabbed her arm, only to have Fin push him in the chest, pushing him back a foot, out of arm's reach of Olivia. She had stilled instantly to his touch and stiffened. Before she could turn around, Cragen's voice boomed from below.

"Detectives. Get back down here! We got a DB on W 36th St. " Taking in the situation on the stairs, he continued, "Fin, Munch, you go." He waved a piece of paper at them. Munch glared at Elliot and then at Olivia before stomping down the stairs, Fin gave Elliot another shove for good measure and followed, leaving the two other detectives alone. Elliot was still stammering. Olivia had never seen him at such a loss for words.

"I'm sorry, Elliot. This wasn't how I intended for you to find out," she said bluntly, without the apologetic tinge to her words that she'd had with Fin and Munch.

"You're leaving? What do you mean?" he asked quietly, staring at her.

"I'm transferring out. Another unit. As of Monday." She kept the details to a minimum.

"Monday? These things take weeks, months even. It can't happen that fast…" his voice trailed off as he realized. "You've known about this for a while." He said bluntly as he realized. She nodded.

"Why?" he asked, not wanting the whole truth, and knowing that he wasn't going to get it.

"I just…I can't do this anymore." She looked him in the eye, daring him to be the one to look away. He was.

"Can't do what? This job? You love this job." He searched her face, looking for something. Her eyes were wide and looking at him as if willing him to understand without her saying it. She just looked at him, communicating to him all of the things that he wished were untrue. Then she turned and walked down the stairs to find out what the story was on their new dead body.

She left him standing at the top of the stairs with his heart in his throat. As she traipsed down the stairs, she realized she had been expecting much more of an explosion out of him. She heard him say quietly "We're not done with this." She didn't stop.

She rubbed her neck as she sat down at her desk, then looked up in surprise as Elliot sat down across from her. She hadn't heard him following her. Cragen walked by and said quietly to her "That didn't go as you planned, did it?" She looked up at him as she flipped through her phone messages. "That is the understatement of the century." He patted her on the shoulder and headed over towards the coffee.

The rest of the day slipped by faster and more easily than she was expecting. Around 6pm she slipped into Cragen's office and shook his hand, accepting his offer for help, anytime, for anything. She passed by her desk, picked up a canvas bag that held the personal things from her desk and locker and then headed for the door. Elliot had gone into one of the interview rooms to talk with a witness, Fin and Munch were still in the field. She knew Elliot would call her later, there was no point in waiting around to have another showdown here. She paused at the door, taking one last look at the room where she had spent the last 10 years, remembering the good and the bad. She was sad to leave, but also looking forward to a fresh start. A new place where no one knew, or needed to know, her past.

She'd arranged to meet Casey for a drink after work, she felt she at least owed her an explanation before just disappearing off the radar. She dropped off her bag at home and headed downtown.

Two hours and three drinks later she climbed out of a taxi. She was surprised, and grateful, that there was no one sitting on her stoop waiting for her. She didn't notice Elliot's car parked partway down the block. About 30 seconds after she'd walked in her door, before she even had a chance to shed her jacket, the buzzer in her apartment went off. It buzzed repeatedly and intermittently. She knew it was Elliot downstairs. He couldn't just buzz like a normal person, had to hit the button 4 or 5 times. She ignored it and walked to the window, seeing him standing on the stoop. She jumped slightly as the buzzer went off again. She hit the talk button and said loudly into it. "Hold on, Stabler. Gimme a minute." She walked into the kitchen, pulled a glass down from the cabinet, wiping it quickly with a towel. She stood on her tiptoes and pulled the bottle of scotch from the cabinet above the refrigerator. She poured a sliver of the golden liquid and tossed it back, then poured a generous two fingers and plopped an ice cube in the glass. She reached in the fridge and pulled out a beer. Pocketing a bottle opener she took the beer and her drink and headed downstairs.

As she opened the door and stepped outside, Elliot turned around. Noticing her coat and the drinks in her hand, he said "I don't even get to come inside anymore?"

"No, not tonight," she said as she handed him the beer. She took a seat on the steps and waited for him to take a seat next to her. He looked at the bottle and then at her as she took a sip of the scotch. She reached in her bottle and pulled out the bottle opener, handed it to him.

He opened the beer and handed it back to her, leaning back onto his elbows on the steps. He could smell the booze on her. He didn't know where she had been but he doubted this was her first drink of the night.

"Where were you earlier?" he asked.

"Out with Casey," Olivia replied with a shrug. "I thought she deserved to know without finding out from a third party." She wasn't quite drunk, but had definitely had her tongue socially lubricated by the alcohol. "Sorry I didn't get a chance to tell you before Munch blew his lid."

He looked over at her out of the corner of his eye. "That's not your first," he said, gesturing towards her drink. "How many have you had?"

She shrugged as she took another sip. "Like mother, like daught—"

"Hey!" He cut her off, he sat up and reached to lift her chin to meet her eye to eye. "Don't you talk about yourself like that." She couldn't help but to flinch when she felt his finger touch her face.

He saw her flinch, saw the moment of hesitation in her eyes before she quickly looked down, away from him.

"Oh my god," he said slowly, rubbing his face with the hand that didn't have the beer. "It's true."

She could feel the alcohol setting down into her stomach, the subtle, familiar burn. The combination of the fresh drink on top of the drinks she had earlier was making her head a little fuzzy, but not so fuzzy she didn't know what he was talking about. She didn't say anything, making him be the one to say it.

"You're afraid of me. You flinch when I come near you. You think I'm going to snap again."

"No, Elliot, I don't." She gave a heavy sigh. "I just…" She didn't know what to say. They sat there in silence each sipping their drinks.

"Olivia…" Elliot began, he couldn't stand the silence, the not knowing.

She cut him off. "It took me two years, Elliot. I just…"

"What took two years, Liv? We've been partners for almost 10."

"It took me two years before I trusted you. I told you about my mother, about my 'father' because I thought you needed to know, but it was almost two years before I really trusted you with that information." She paused before going on. "We were working a case, were debating how you never know what genes you're going to pass on to your kids. I said something about have a drunk mother and a violent father that I didn't know anything about. You interrupted me before I could finish my thought and said…" she stopped and took another sip of her drink. "You said 'And look how good you turned out.'" She said it with a crooked smile, as if she was embarrassed to be saying it out loud. She went on "And then in the next breath, you invited me to dinner at your house that night. As if it was no big deal." She took another small sip, thinking she had to slow down or she'd end plastered.

"Liv, it wasn't a big deal, it's not a big deal,"

"It was too me." They both could hear her voice shaking. Olivia swallowed and willed it steady. "That day….that day was one of the few times I have really missed my mother. I wished she was still alive so I could tell her…Tell her that there was a man out there who was a _good man_ who didn't believe all of those things. One who knew all the horrible, _dirty_ things about me and still invited me to his house to see his _children._"

"Olivia…"

She didn't let him finished. "I trusted you, Elliot. I trusted you with everything and…and I can't anymore." She took another sip and looked down at her hands. Thank god for alcohol. She wasn't a drunk like her mother, but she could appreciate the numbing affect.

"You can't trust me to have your back anymore? Can't be my partner anymore. I understand the other bit. I hurt you and I am so, so sorry. I can't fix that, I know, but…" He drifted off. He knew he had lost a part of her he would never get back, but he couldn't lose her entirely. She stabilized him, she made him a better detective, a better person, a better father. He couldn't let her leave."

She thought about what he'd said for a minute before replying. "No, El, I trust you to have my back. I trusted you for that within 5 minutes of meeting you and I would trust you with my life for as long as I draw breath. But my heart, El, my heart….That I can't trust you with anymore. And the problem is….The problem is Elliot, is that with you, I can't separate the two anymore."

She looked at her glass, still with at least an ounce of scotch in it. She fished out the ice cube with her fingers and tossed in into the tree planter on the sidewalk. She finished the rest of the drink in one swallow and stood, patting her former partner on the shoulder. "See you around, Stabler." She let herself inside, leaving him sitting unmoving on the steps. Up in her apartment, she looked out the window and saw him still sitting on the steps, his position unchanged since she'd left. Taking a deep breath, she stripped off her clothes and put herself to bed without supper.

**Up next: Cragen vs Elliot, Elliot vs Fin, Olivia and the new precinct… **

**Pls review. **


	7. Chapter 7

_And the problem is….The problem is Elliot, is that with you, I can't separate the two anymore." _

_She looked at her glass, still with at least an ounce of scotch in it. She fished out the ice cube with her fingers and tossed in into the tree planter on the sidewalk. She finished the rest of the drink in one swallow and stood, patting her former partner on the shoulder. "See you around, Stabler." She let herself inside, leaving him sitting unmoving on the steps. Up in her apartment, she looked out the window and saw him still sitting on the steps, his position unchanged since she'd left. Taking a deep breath, she stripped off her clothes and put herself to bed without supper. _

Slap: Chapter 7

Elliot sat on the stoop until he felt his backside go numb. Looking at his watch, he noted it was only 9:30pm. With the late shift, Fin and Munch, and probably Cragen, were still at the precinct. He couldn't go home now, couldn't face his wife and children in the mood he was in. He fingered the beer bottle he was still holding, it was still half full; he hadn't taken a drink since Olivia had gone up stairs leaving him alone. He tossed the bottle into the trash cans in the alley and looked up at Olivia's familiar apartment windows. They were dark. Sighing heavily, he turned towards his car and headed back to the precinct. He wasn't sure what he was going to do there, but figured there was always paperwork to use as an excuse. He climbed the stairs to the old building slowly, texting Kathy and telling her he would be late and to call if she needed anything.

He slid into his desk with a sigh and pulled a couple of files, beginning the tedious process of completing the forms. He saw Fin and Munch coming from interrogation and Cragen moving around in his office.

As he entered the bullpen, Fin saw the hunched form of Elliot at his desk. As he approached, he said "Stabler! Wasn't expecting you back tonight. Where you been? Liv's?"

"Yeah."

"Hard to believe she's really left. You talk to her?" Fin wasn't going to skip an opportunity to needle this guy, he felt Elliot deserved every prick.

"Yeah."

"Well you're just full of information tonight aren't you?"

Elliot tossed his pen onto the desk. "What do you want from me, Detective?" he snarled.

"I would like to have a word with you. Upstairs." Elliot didn't say a word, but got up and stalked up the stairs, not even checking to see if Fin was following him,

Upstairs in the locker room, Elliot stood against the lockers, arms crossed, waiting for Fin. When he entered, he looked up, but still didn't say a word. Fin walked across the room and took a seat on the bench.

"Look, Stabler," he said, his voice a lot calmer and not at all angry, not at all what Elliot was expecting. "I know we have had our differences in the past, but we are stuck working together. And I think in order for us to continue working together, you need to tell me what went down between you and Benson, cause otherwise I'm not sure I can trust you. And I can't work with you unless I trust you. And I will tell the Captain that, if I have to. Frankly, I hope it doesn't come to that. So spill it, what the f*** happened?"

"Ahhh, I..." he didn't continue. Finally he looked up, Fin was still staring at him intently, not moving, just waiting for his answers.

Elliot came around and sat on the bench, on the far end, as far away as he could be sitting from his coworker. "Look, man, you gotta tell me cause I swear it cannot possibly be as bad as the shit I am making up in my head, so if we are going to have anything remotely looking like a working relationship, you gotta tell me," Fin said. "Start right before Benson showed up at work in a cast."

Seeing that there was no way out of this, and sensing that he really did need to talk to Fin in order to work with him, and with Benson gone, he was going to have to do that a lot more often, he sighed and rubbed his face. Then he started talking.

"I was upset, about a case, and uh, because of Kathy and Olivia came up here to try and talk me down. I said some horrible things to her, -"

Fin interrupted him. "What'd you say?"

Elliot looked at Fin defiantly, showing him for the first time any emotion in the interaction. "Just know that it was bad, it was horrible. And I can never repeat it. It hurt her badly and there is nothing I regret more."

"So what'd she do after that? That's why she quit? Cause you hurt her feelings? I don't buy it. You guys are close, I get it, but come on, Benson doesn't get her feelings hurt."

"No, Benson doesn't let you KNOW she gets her feelings hurt." Elliot shot back.

"So, what'd she say?"

"Nothing. She didn't say anything." Fin was still just looking at his quizzically. "She slapped me. And then...then...I slapped her back. I was out of control, man, I had no idea what was going on, I grabbed her and just stood there and she stood there just staring at me, like I had...like i had..." He couldn't actually bring himself to say it.

"Like what?"

"Like I hurt her feelings. And this is Olivia Benson we're talking about, she doesn't get that look. Not ever. Then she left and told Cragen I had to get my head shrunk. She stopped talking to me and then she quit and here we are." He stood up and ran his hands over his short brown hair. "How could I have let this happen? How could I have done that?" His cries were loud and anguished. He began pacing in the locker room.

Fin stood up and the next time Elliot walked past him, he pulled back his arm and swung his fist right into Elliot's face. Elliot stumbled backwards into the lockers. "What the hell, Fin?"

"What the hell to me? What the hell to you Elliot! You think you can just sit there and tell me you HIT Olivia and I'm just going to sit here and listen to it. I take it back, I-"

"Excuse me? Did I just hear that properly?" Captain Cragen was standing in the doorway to the locker room and had obviously heard the last part of the conversation. The two detectives froze, neither saying another word.

tbc


	8. Chapter 8

_"Excuse me? Did I just hear that properly?" Captain Cragen was standing _

_in the doorway to the locker room and had obviously heard the last part of _

_the conversation. The two detectives froze, neither saying another word_.

Slap Chapter 8

"Tutuola, you need to get back downstairs and meet with your perp and his lawyer. Then you need to meet me in my office. Detective Stabler, my office NOW." He turned briskly on his heel and walked out of the room.

Fin gave Elliot one last glare before stomping down the steps. Elliot watched him go. He yelled obscenities to no one in particular and punched his already dented locker once more for good measure.

In his dimly lit office Cragen sat behind his desk. He rarely felt the need to drink anymore, he'd developed many different ways of coping that didn't involve vodka, but right now he would have paid a LOT of money to be able to let the alcohol dull his senses. He saw Elliot outside his door and waved him in without a word. The detective walked him and sat down in the wooden chair, wordless.

"What the hell, Stabler." It was a comment as much as a question. "What am I supposed to do now? Shit, Elliot. You HIT her?"

"No, I mean, yes, but..." His Captain's eyebrows shot up at the 'but'.

"But? But? Elliot, we both no there can be no 'but' in a case like this.

Elliot sighed. '"I know." He continue to tell the entire story over to his captain, including the words, the slap, the look Olivia had given him and how she had failed to react.

"When was this?" Cragen asked.

"About a month ago."

"The day she gave me that ultimatum." It wasn't really a question.

"Yeah."

"Have you talked to her?"

"Barely."

"I don't know what'g going to happen to you here, but you need to fix this. With her. I don't know how you are going to, but you need to. If you don't, you both will regret it. Now get out of my sight. I don't know what I'm going to do with this. I'm let you know in the morning."

Elliot still sat, unmoving in the chair.

"Go, Elliot. Now!"

He left work and drove slowly home, taking the backroads instead of the highway. Reaching his home just before 11pm. His eye was swollen and bruised. He thought about what he was going to tell Kathy. He finally settled on the truth. It was a relief.

Cragen spent all night in his office, mulling over his decision, catching a few hours sleep on his cot. He'd talked with Fin at one point, discovered how deep the rift between his remaining detectives went. It was not as deep as he had originally thought. Turns out Tutuola's biggest issue was Benson's issue. If she could deal with Stabler, so could Fin. As soon as the hour was reasonable, he called Olivia and told her he was on his way over.

He knocked on the door and she had opened it promptly, mug of coffee in hand. She was wearing lounge pants and a grey t-shirt layered over a long sleeved white one, obviously appreciating a rare morning off.

"It's been less than 24 hours, Captain. You miss me that much?" she tried to joke, knowing that wasn't why he was there. He didn't say anything and she said "Somehow I don't think you are here about a case."

"I had a talk with Elliot last night," he said out of the blue. She turned to look at her old boss.

"He's no longer my partner, Captain. He is no longer my responsibility or my problem."

"But he is still your friend?" he countered. She pursed her lips but didn't reply. "Olivia, he told me he hit you?" He said it as if it was a question, as if he needed her confirmation, which he didn't, he had known it was the truth.

Olivia set down her coffee in order to use her hands when she talked. "Shit, Don, how much longer is this going to follow me? I did everything I could, I made him go to effing therapy, and I am still getting harassed about this. Fin. You! I officially transferred, what more do I need to do?"

"Olivia." He paused, not sure how to say what he wanted to say. She was right, he was no longer her boss, but he was Elliot's, and complicated things. "Olivia. I am no longer your commanding officer, but I am still your friend. What happened?"

She picked up her coffee and took a long drink, the strong drink burning her throat. It was a welcome feeling compared the words she was about to say.

"We...argued." Cragen looked at her at that and started to say something but she stopped him. "We argued and he said some things that he intended to hurt me and they did, and I knew that was why he was doing it. I slapped him, then he slapped me back, twice. He didn't hurt me, not really, but he wasn't in his right mind, Cap. He wasn't in control. I couldn't...I can't...We're too far gone. The problem Cap, is not the things he said, or the things he did. The problem is with me. The problem is that I stopped being able to differentiate myself. I believed him, Don! I know it's not true, I know all of that, but that shrink was right, all those years ago. We were too close. I can't separate myself from him, and I couldn't separate myself from the words that he said. We've been on borrowed time, Cap. You knew that long before we did."

He'd left her apartment with a heavy heart, both because of what he knew she was going through and because of his own failure to see what was happening, for his own failure to act before it was too late. He'd failed to act and it had cost him a detective and a friend. He just had to hope he wouldn't lose one or more others.

Later that morning he'd pulled Stabler into his office, telling him he was making official the requirement for seeing a shrink.

"I have in front of me," he gestured to a form, filled out in triplicate, "an Incident Report Form, filled out complete, signed and dated, with all the details." He handed it to the detective, who read it through, pale. It was an amazingly accurate description of what had happened. Olivia still swore that the cast was from falling in the park. He didn't believe her but she was sticking by that story. The rest was true, he'd run it by her and she agreed with what he had written. It outlined exactly what had happened, and the disciplinary actions taken, which included mandated psychiatric sessions for Stabler and two days of desk duty for both officers, which had actually occurred, though incidentally. It also was an official mark on the record of the offending officer. Something that would follow him the rest of his career, mar his arrests and his ability to be promoted.

Cragen looked at the detective closely, watching him read the form, gauging his reaction. He had been different in the past month; being forced into therapy and then losing his partner of 10 years had hit him hard. The shiner he gotten from Fin last night wasn't helping his appearance.

As he finished and passed the form back, he looked sharply at his Captain but didn't say anything.

Cragen spoke "I thought about writing it off, or writing it as a momentary loss of common sense, a heat of the moment argument."

"But you didn't." The first words Elliot spoke were, yet still sounded sad, as if he was a man who knew, without a doubt, that he had lost everything.

"No, I didn't. Because it wouldn't be true. You hitting Olivia was very different than Fin hitting you and you know it." Elliot sat, unmoved. "You didn't take a swing at your partner because you were angry with her. You _slapped_ her because you were angry with yourself and you were out of control and THAT is unacceptable." He looked for a reaction from the younger detective and didn't get one. "Olivia saved your ass, and I think you know that. She told me you guys had been on borrowed time. Well, now she's gone and you are here on your own, on borrowed time."

He went on, "I am putting this form in my desk, locked. The _minute_ you screw up, the minute I hear from Huang you are avoiding him, the minute Olivia asks me to, it comes out of my desk and into your file, fully dated and in the appropriate chronological order. Understand?"

Over the next week, Olivia settled in to her new precinct. The work wasn't too different from what she was used to, the pace was a little less intense and the lack of children was a welcome relief. She'd been partnered up with an experienced detective named Gary Olvetti. He was in his mid –fifties she figured, a cop's cop, with a handle brush mustache and totally white hair. They got along fine so far. He didn't ask too many personal questions, and the ones that that he did ask were easy to deflect. He was calm and collected, rarely raised his voice even with the suspects, easy to work with. They were still working out the bugs of a new partnership, but she thought it was going to work out fine. He was certainly less complicated and far less work than Elliot Stabler. She hadn't spoken with Elliot since the night on her stoop. Fin had called her and told her about what had happened later that night at the precinct. She knew she needed to call him soon or it would be too late, it would be even more awkward and difficult to salvage whatever relationship they had left.

Olvetti had asked where she'd come from and she'd answered the 1-6, knowing that any decent detective would have already have looked up his new partner in the system, asking was just polite. "Ah, the 1-6. Dilapidated old building over there, isn't it? You'll find we have some of the finer upgrades here. Notice our phones were made sometime after 1983…" He went on without a pause. "An old buddy of mine works out of the 1-6, we used to be partners back in the day, before his conspiracy theories turned my hair white." He ran his hand over his white hair. "John Munch, you know him?"

"Yeah," Olivia said. "You know Munch?"

"Yeah, for years. He still driving everyone nuts with his wild hypotheses?"

"Every chance he gets." She replied with a smile.

"Good to know he hasn't changed," he said, making a mental note to make sure he met John for a drink soon to find out the digs on his new partner.

The Friday of her second week she and Olvetti were leaving the courthouse, walking down the steps and chatting with their ADA, a man in his mid-thirties. "Hey," Olvetti said to her, "You wanna hotdog? My treat." He gestured toward the stand on the street corner.

"Yeah, sure," she said. Olvetti looked at the lawyer Mark Rufford, who shook his head. Olvetti continued down the steps, then stopped after 4 or 5 and looked back

at Olivia.

"Whaddyu like on it?" he asked in a thick Brooklyn accent.

"Mustard, no relish. And a Diet Coke," she replied. He nodded and headed towards the street vendor. Olivia looked back at Rufford and shook her head. "Breaking in a new partner is almost as much work as breaking in a new boyfriend."

"Tell me about it," the lawyer replied and winked at her. "You do that often? Break in new boyfriends?" Her eyebrows shot up, 'was he flirting with her?'

"Ah, no," she said, giving him the back off signal.

He smiled at her. "My last boyfriend never did figure out how I liked my coffee, finally had to cut him loose," he said with a smirk.

'Ah,' she thought. 'So that's how it was.' She smiled back and said with all seriousness "Coffee is incredibly important, I understand."

"Allright, I've gotta lunch meeting. Talk to you later, Detective." He nodded at her and headed down the steps. As she watched him go, she heard a yell from behind her.

"Benson!"

She looked back and saw Casey Novak hurrying down the steps towards her. She smiled and turned to hug the woman who had become more friend and less coworker in the past two weeks. She didn't notice her partner's head jump up in alert after hearing her name yelled, his hand go immediately to his weapon. She also didn't notice the man standing in front of her partner, whose head snapped up, eye's peeled towards the steps, hand also trained on his weapon.

On the steps, she gave Casey a squeeze and then stepped back, catching the eye of her partner and letting him know silently everything was fine. She noticed the familiar form behind him and quickly turned back towards Casey. She looked at her friend with wide eyes.

"That your new partner?" Casey asked.

"Yeah," Olivia said simply

"You see who is standing right next to him?" Casey asked, immediately understanding the look Olivia was giving her.

"Yeah, I'm waiting to see what's going to happen," she said.

"Maybe nothing, they don't know each other…" Casey said.

"No," Olivia replied. "Elliot will be wearing his badge and Olvetti is incapable of running into any NYPD officer without shooting the shit with him. They'll talk."

Casey tilted her head, considering this. "How's it going with him?"

Olivia thought for a moment. "Good. He's a good man, a good cop. As far as I can tell he wears the same blue shirt and brown pants to work every day. He can't understand why I don't wear the same thing everyday. He makes fun of my clothes, I make fun of his mustache. So far it's working."

"But he's not Elliot." Casey said it bluntly, pointing out what she had left out.

"No. Thank god for that," she replied.

They chatted for a short while, catching up on things, while Olivia had one eye on the situation down on the sidewalk. "I should probably head down there before things get even more awkward," she said. Casey nodded and joined her down the steps.

Down at the hotdog stand, Elliot had just given his order when he'd heard Casey yell Benson's name. His head had swung up, hand trained on his weapon before he'd recognized her voice and then relaxed when he saw the red-haired ADA on the steps. He hadn't expected the man next to him to do the same. He saw the older man eyeball the situation on the steps and then turn back to the vendor. Olivia had looked up at them, and while he wasn't sure she'd seen him, he knew Olivia, knew her powers of observation, and he knew she knew he was there. He turned to look at the man beside him while he waited for his dog.

He shifted his badge over a little to allow the man to see it and casually said "Hey, how's it goin?"

Olvetti nodded back "So far, so good."

'Brooklyn,' Elliot thought, born and bred. Olvetti caught sight of the badge hanging from the chain on Elliot's neck.

"Hey, NYPD?" he asked. He stuck out his hand. "Detective Gary Olvetti, the 0-9."

"Hey, good to meet you, Detective. Detective Stabler." He gestured with his head towards the steps where Olivia and Casey were still chatting. "That your partner?"

Olvetti narrowed his eyes, noticing the ring on Elliot's left hand. "A married man like you interested in the pretty lady cop, Detective?" he asked suspiciously.

Elliot lifted up his hands as if in surrender, "Hey, no worries." He stuck out his hand towards Olvetti, "Elliot Stabler, the 1-6." Elliot saw the light go on in Olvetti's eyes.

"Ah, the 1-6. So you know my partner up there then?"

"Benson. Ah, yeah. She's one of the good ones," Elliot said simply. He left out the complicated history the two of them shared.

"She's a complicated woman, that one," Olvetti replied.

"The good ones always are. So how's is going for you guys at the 0-9? She settling in okay?"

"Sure…so far, so good."

"Good." He paused as he took his dog from the vendor and then waited as Olvetti placed his order, thinking in his head, 'mustard, no relish…and a Diet Coke.'

"She eating okay?"

"Who, Benson? Sure, far as I know." Olvetti looked at the guy he had just met wondering exactly what kind of relationship this guy had with his new partner. He shrugged inwardly and figured it wasn't the first heterosexual partnership to go bad because of jealousy or sexual tension.

The vendor handed Olvetti his hotdogs and sodas. Olvetti turned to Elliot and nodded, his hands full.

Elliot looked back at Casey and Olivia, now headed towards them. He looked over at Olvetti and said before the women were in earshot, "You look after

her, understand? I owe her everything." Olvetti looked back at him and nodded, sharing an understanding that experienced cops had.

Olvetti held out the hotdogs towards Olivia as she approached and she took the one intended for her. "I see you two have met." She said with a smile at the two men. "Hey, Liv." Elliot said, almost sheepishly. "How are you?"

"I'm good, Elliot. You?" she said, trying not to make it sound awkward.

"Good, good," he replied.

"Gary, this is Casey Novak, ADA. Casey, this is my partner, Gary Olvetti." Casey reached out to shake his hand. He stashed a soda can under his arm and managed a shake.

In the pause after the introductions, Elliot said "I've gotten run back to court. It was good seeing you, Benson. Nice to meet you, Olvetti. Casey, I'll talk to you later about the Morris case." He gave them all a nod and jogged up the steps.

Olivia tried to fill the silence that followed "Casey was, is, the ADA over at SVU."

"Ah, so you must know my partner pretty well then, "Olvetti replied, taking a bit of his hotdog.

"Something like that," Casey replied. "She bust any balls yet?"

"A few," Olvetti replied with a grin.

Casey shot back "Cops or perps?"

Olvetti snorted with his mouth full. "A few of each."

"I expected no less," Casey said. "Whose your new ADA over at Homicide since Hammond left?" she asked.

"Ah, Rufford, Mark," Olivia replied between sips of her soda. "What do you know about him?"

"I don't know him, but I've seen him around, hard not to, you know?" She gave Olivia a look.

The detective smiled as she swallowed, "Yeah, he plays for the other team, Case."

"Damn," the red head said sheepishly. "What a shame. Well, by reputation he's a good prosecutor. Not particularly creative, but very good at what he does. "

"I can work with that," Olivia replied, taking another bite.

Casey looked at her friend, she didn't look like she had lost any more weight in the past two weeks, but she was still very skinny. She asked

"You eating okay, Liv?"

"Causpha" Olivia replied, exasperated, with her mouth full of hotdog. She gestured wildly to her mouth, as if to say 'obviously I am eating. Back off.'

"Okay, okay," the red head back-peddled. "Just checking. I'm sure there is some fire I have to put out in the office, I'm gonna grab a sandwich and head back. Nice to meet you, Detective," she said towards Olvetti.

Olivia swallowed the last of her hotdog and said to her partner, "Let's head back?" He still had 2/3 of his second hotdog left. He dug into his pocket and tossed her the keys as they headed towards their car.

In the car on the way back to the station, Olvetti polished off his lunch. "So, this Stabler seems like a good guy."

Olivia didn't reply right away. One of Olvetti's more annoying habits was his inability to sit in silence.

"Yeah, he is," replying slowly and softly, trying to keep her voice even.

"How long have you known him?" he asked innocently.

"Ten years."

Olvetti thought about that a minute. There was more here than met the eye. "Ten years is a long time."

"Yeah."

"I got the impression from him that you saved his life recently. That why you transferred?"

Okay, now he was getting into territory she was not about to discuss.

"We were partners for 10 years, Gary. I saved his life numerous times and he did the same for me." She was giving him very loud, very clear signals that this conversation was over. He wasn't stupid, or oblivious. She also suspected he wasn't going to drop this quite yet.

Olvetti was an experienced detective; he noticed his partner's stiff shoulders and white knuckles on the steering wheel. "I'm sure," he said simply. Then he went on, "But I don't think that is what he was talking about."

She didn't reply. She'd be damned before she'd talk about this with him. That was the whole point of transferring, to leave all that behind. They sat in

silence the rest of the way back.

Later that night, Olvetti shrugged off his coat as he slipped onto a bar stool, his cuffs rubbing on the bar worn smooth with years of use. He looked over at his old friend and smiled. "Hey, Munch. How's it goin?"

The thin man looked over at him over his glasses and said, "The man still hasn't gotten me down." He reached over and shook the hand of his old friend.

"So how's Benson working out for you? She kick your fluffy white ass yet?" Munch asked as he sipped his beer.

"She's a tough cookie, that one. Can't seem to get a read on her. She seems like a good cop though, went toe to toe with Crenshaw. He's this uptight rookie we have, thinks he knows everything and that every rule in the book has to be followed to a tee. She went right for a jugular, took him down a peg or two. Won over a lot of hearts in the squad that day." He stopped and took a sip of his beer. "I just can't figure out what makes her tick, won't tell me anything remotely personal. All I've gotten out of her is that she grew up in the city and that she's not married. Never met a woman who doesn't like to talk about herself. Can't get Jules and my girls to quiet down…" He paused as he took a sip. "So what's her deal?" he asked his old friend.

Munch took another sip before he answered. "She's a good cop, a good detective. Loyal, straight-shooter. Always has been quiet about herself though. She'll tell you when she's ready, when she thinks she can trust you." He muttered under his breath "Lord knows that's gotten her into trouble before…" Olvetti couldn't quite hear what John had muttered, but he kind of got the gist.

"Hey," Munch asked. "You notice Benson eating? Like you grab food together and she eats it?"

"Yeah, she eats. Got Chinese before we left tonight, she ate half my eggrolls. Yesterday we had burgers and she ate half my fries after telling me she didn't want any. Last time I make that mistake," he grumbled.

John pursed his lips and nodded. 'Good,' he thought. At least that wasn't going to be a problem.

"Why, Munch? I gotta be worried about something? I don't got time to be worried about shit like that at work," Olvetti replied.

"No, don't be bothered by that. Olivia tends to internalize shit, when things get bad she doesn't eat or sleep. Just checking in…"

"Hmph. That a problem before she left? Something happened, didn't it? You don't just transfer after a decade for no reason." Olvetti looked at his old friend who was looking intently at his beer. John was thinking about what had gone down at the precinct the night Olivia had left.

"Nah, she's fine. She'll tell you if she wants you to know. No big deal, huh?" Munch said. He wasn't going to share what he knew, even if Olvetti was his old buddy, not if Olivia didn't want him to know.

"Allright then." He lifted his beer and tilted towards Munch in a silent toast.

Munch jumped back in "You really want to rattle her chain though, jiggle your leg really fast under your desk so it makes the whole floor shake. She hates that!"

Olvetti smiled. "Duly noted. What else?"

tbc


	9. Chapter 9

Slap: Chapter 9

The morning passed quickly and suddenly Olivia found herself furiously trying to finish up a series of reports that she needed to file in the next three hours so they could keep their suspect locked up. It was close to 1pm and she hadn't eaten lunch yet. Her stomach was rumbling. She'd skipped dinner the night before, it'd been a stressful day and she'd relaxed with a run and then a whiskey; she hadn't felt like eating after the booze, she enjoyed the burning feeling in the pit of her stomach. She'd topped off with a large coffee with milk in the morning; that would get her through.

Olvetti strolled up to her desk and unceremoniously dropped a paper-wrapped sandwich on her desk. "What is this?" she asked, curious and a little annoyed at being interrupted.

"Turkey sub. Eat it."

"What? Why?"

"Why, Benson? Because it's lunchtime. And because three separate people in the last 24 hours have asked me if you eat. I don't want that hanging over my head, so eat it."

"Look, Olvetti, clearly I'm fine, don't worry about it." She gave him a look of pure exasperation. "But thanks for the sub. Pickles?"

"No pickles," he said.

"Good." She unwrapped the sandwich and started to eat.

The next morning they were trading off between finishing paperwork and interrogating their latest suspect or witness, depending on who you asked. Olivia had just come out of the interrogation room and was leaning on the side of her desk, telling Olvetti what she had just learned. Olvetti was listening to her when his eyes focused on something happening at the guard desk out in the hallway. He saw a blond teenager asking the guard something. The uniformed officer leaned forward, pointed at Benson and looked back at the girl. He could see her thank him and then come into the room hesitantly, her eyes looking at his partner. He held us his hand, stopping her description. "I think someone is here looking for you." He gestured behind her.

Olivia turned around and saw Kathleen Stabler standing nervously in front of her.

"Kathleen! What are you doing here? Is everything okay?" She stood up to give the girl a hug. She was rewarded with a quick smile.

"Everything's fine. Sorry to bother you at work, I just wanted your help." The girl shifted slightly, foot to foot.

"How did you know where to find me?" Olivia asked curiously.

"My dad said you transferred. I just googled you. Everything with cops is public record, Olivia. It just popped right up," she answered, as if everybody should know.

Olivia just nodded, showing Kathleen to the chair next to her desk. Olvetti gave her a look and then made himself busy in the other room.

"So what did you want help with?" She could tell by Kathleen's attitude that is wasn't anything too serious, but she was curious as to what would bring her all the way into the city.

"I have to decide on colleges by this weekend. I've made some lists, but I was wondering if you would help me sort out what I think…" She laid out several pieces of notebook paper on the desk.

Olivia couldn't help but smile as she looked over the papers. "So what do *you* think?" she asked. Kathleen smoothed out the papers and explained what she wanted and why and why she didn't want the other schools.

Olivia nodded her head and smiled at the girl as Olvetti took a seat at his desk again. "Sounds like you have a pretty good idea what you want already, Kathleen." She paused for a minute, wondering if she could get to the bottom of this. "You could've talked about this with your mom, or Maureen. Why come all the way into the city to talk with me?"

Kathleen shuffled the papers around into a stack and then looked up at the brunette. "I have to meet my dad for lunch to 't_alk things over_.' This means me listen to him argue why I should go to the Catholic University and live at home. I don't want that. And whenever I, or my mom, or Maureen debate with my dad, he ALWAYS win. When YOU debate with him, YOU win. So, I figure you tell me what to say and how to say it, and then I go to Stoneybrook and live in the dorms." She looked up at Olivia with wide eyes.

Olivia fought back a chuckle and said "Kathleen, you are going to do just fine in college, wherever you end up. Now, here's what you say to your dad…." She proceeded to help Kathleen line up an argument that she knew would make her father agree, if not be entirely happy about it.

Twenty minutes later, Kathleen left the building, notes in hand and instructions to let her know how it went. Olivia went back to her files, a small smirk on her face. As soon as the girl left the room, Olvetti was at her side. "What was THAT about? Who's the kid?"

"That was Kathleen Stabler." She said it simply, not offering him anything extra. He could keep his nosy self on his side of the desk.

"That was Stabler's kid? What'd she need? Anything wrong?"

"Gosh, you're nosy." She said it with a smirk, hoping he would drop it.

"So what'd she want from you?" he pushed.

"She wanted help on how to talk to her father about colleges."

"And she came to you because….?"

"Because I know how to change her father's mind. Look, I've known her for years, since she was practically a baby. I look out for her."

Olvetti just nodded at her. Curious, he thought. This woman acted as if her life was incredibly simple, but the more he got to know her, the more he was realizing there was a lot more to her than he had thought, she just wasn't going to share any of it.

"You ever think about having kids?" he asked her suddenly.

Olivia didn't respond, pointedly ignoring him, which she did often when he asked any questions that were personal.

"Hey, Benson," he went on, "it's been almost a month. One personal question in a month. You gotta throw me a bone sometime."

She didn't meet his eye, but rolled her shoulders back. "Okay, fine. No,I have never seriously considered having children."

"Why not?" he followed up.

"Because it would not be a good idea." She said simply. It was an explanation that was not really an explanation. "That was two questions."

He opened his mouth to argue that that wasn't a good explanation, but decided against it.


	10. Chapter 10

Slap: Chapter 10

Olivia was settling in and starting to actually enjoy having some spare time. The workload was more manageable at Homicide than at SVU, a side benefit of having victims that were dead and of being properly staffed. She knew that wasn't going to last forever, but for the time being she was going to appreciate it. That all came crashing to a halt when they pulled a case of an estranged husband found beaten to death. Something wasn't sitting right about it and they'd all spent long hours trying to sort out who knew what and when. She had spent hours and hours pouring over the witness reports. The estranged wife and their 11-year-old son were part of what were bothering her. She was pretty sure they both knew more than they were saying. She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair; she'd cut it short again and she felt more like herself. She glanced at the clock, trying to put the time out of her mind when she saw it was past 1am.

She'd grabbed a couple hours of sleep on the sofa in the locker room upstairs and was downstairs pouring her first cup of coffee when Olvetti entered the squadroom. Noticing she was still in the same clothes as yesterday, he said "I see you have finally adopted the Gary Olvetti fashion plan, same clothes each day, saves on the decision making when you have 7of the same shirt…"

She didn't reply, but drank her coffee while glaring at him over her mug. "You really not go home last night?" he asked.

She didn't reply to that either, but she did grab the file and go over her theory with him. He nodded several times, understanding immediately what she was getting at. "You wanna go talk to the Lassley's again?" She was already grabbing her coat.

They knocked on the door of the Lassley's 1st floor apartment. It was just past 9am. The door opened a crack and they saw Colin, the son, looking out at them under the door chain. They talked him into opening the door, but he wouldn't let them inside. He kept saying his mom was sick, she wouldn't like them inside, she had a headache, no-please don't wake her up. Something was niggling in the back of Olivia's head. She glanced at the apartment over Colin's head, noting the figure sleeping on the couch, and then recognizing the telltale trash can next to the couch, the empty bottles on the floor, the fear in Colin's voice when they mentioned waking up his mother. Suddenly she understood. She looked at Colin with a new sense of understanding and put her hand on Olvetti's arm, silently asking him to back off. She handed the boy her card, speaking quietly and telling him to call her anytime, for anything. Olvetti was staring at her open mouthed as Colin took her card and then closed the door.

"What the hell was that, Benson?" he demanded as soon as they were down the hall. "We got absolutely nothing out of that kid, just cause you didn't want to wake up the mom?" He sounded pissed and incredulous at how she had shut things down.

"The kid was too scared to talk, you saw him. Plus the mom wasn't sleeping, she was passed out drunk on the couch. Waking her up wouldn't get us anywhere, it's impossible to interview a drunk witness; we'd only make her mad and then she'd take it out on the kid. We can come back this afternoon."

"Drunk? What makes you think she was drunk, not just sick?" Olvetti asked, still skeptical.

"She was drunk, trust me. Didn't you see the trash can, the empty bottles?"

"If you say so…" he replied, still skeptical. They turned and headed out of the building. As they turned to wait for the elevator, Olivia saw Calvin's head peeking out at them from behind the door. He ducked inside when he saw he had caught her notice. Olivia shook her hard, partly in pity for the boy and partly to rid her own mind of memories of her own mother passed out on the couch.

"So, what do we do now that we don't have a witness to interview until pretty princess in there decides to sober up?" Olvetti asked sarcastically. He wasn't hot tempered, but he could still be an ass. Luckily she didn't take it personally.

"Let's follow the money." Olivia suggested. "We should have financials on all the parties by now, let's see what we find."

They spent hours tracking through financials of the husband, the wife and various dubious acquaintances of both before Olvetti found something worthwhile. He found the paper trail: A serious of cash payments from Angela Lassley to an acquaintance, one who met a description of the attacker and had a history of jail time for assault. They called the ADA and started the process for warrants for search and arrests. Olivia was pulled out of her trance when her phone buzzed. She glanced at it and saw multiple text messages from Elliot. Curious as to what he could possibly want from her, she read through the messages quickly.

** Need to talk to you. Got a minute? I'm on your side of town, meet me outside in 5 minutes?**

She had an uncomfortable feeling in her gut, but agreed to meet him outside, replying in a text. She'd tried to keep communication open, they'd even called each other once or twice to catch up in the past few weeks, but it was hard going; they'd lost their easy assurance with each other.

**Okay. 5 minutes. See you outside.** She had replied via text.

She finished up what she was doing and grabbed her coat. "I'm gonna run out for a minute. Back in 10." She said this to her partner as she was on her way out. Always perceptive, (at least he thought of it as perceptive, Olivia would have called it nosy), he watched his partner run towards the stairs. He couldn't in good conscious follow her, but he'd keep an eye on the clock and see how long she was outside.

Olivia took the chance to grab a coffee from the street vendor outside the station. She sipped at the familiar blue and white cup with Greek design and saw Elliot walking up the street towards her.

"Hey, El," she said in a friendly voice. "How are you?"

"I'm fine." He was tense, she could tell he was agitated about something, nervous about her, or something else, she couldn't tell. He jumped right into it. "So I'm talking to Kathleen about going to college and she throws this whole song and dance at me about going to SUNY Stoneybrook and living in the dorms. Totally hoodwinks me and the next thing I know I'm agreeing." He looked at his former partner, could see the realization appear in her brown eyes. It was all the confirmation he needed. "What the hell are you talking to my kids for, Liv? You leave them alone. What am I going to do? She's going to be all the way over in Long Island, I can't check on her from there, you know how she is. She's..."

"What?" Liv jumped in. "She's an 18 year old girl, Elliot, not an infant. She's going to college. You're not SUPPOSED to be keeping tabs on her."

"So you just encouraged her to move out of my house?" he said in a harsh voice, the sound was tight and strained.

"No. Look, El, she came to me, asked for advice. I think she wanted to talk to an adult that wasn't her parent, so we talked. She didn't tell you anything that didn't come straight from her; I'm not into brainwashing your kids."

"You shouldn't be talking to my kids at all. You go off an leave me and then you're still talking to them!" He was getting angrier and angrier, letting the argument heat him up.

"Look, I told you! She came to me, I'm not going to throw her out. You can't keep her locked up El, she's an adult. You need to realize that. Her wanting to go live in the dorms has nothing with her rejecting you, it's about her wanting to have a NORMAL college experience."

"You...You...just leave her alone!" He almost spat the words at her.

She didn't like the look in his eyes, didn't like his posture. She couldn't believe after 10 years, after everything they had been through, he was throwing this at her. "What happened, Stabler? Finally decide you didn't want my tainted blood around your kids after all?" She glared at him as she said it, throwing sparks with her eyes. Elliot stopped short when she said that. He knew she was mad, and he heard her angry words, but all he saw what the hurt look in her eyes. She spun around and tossed her nearly full coffee in the trash can as she jogged back into the building, leaving her old partner standing on the sidewalk. As she headed back inside she wished she had dumped the coffee on him.

Inside, Olvetti had let his curiosity get the better of him had been watching from the doorway, he was just heading outside as his partner came storming in the door. Glancing out the open door as she ran by without even noticing him, he saw Elliot Stabler standing on the sidewalk looking for all the world like someone had kicked him in the face. He turned and followed his partner back towards their desks.

A thousand thoughts ran through Elliot's head. The first was 'damn, she was right. He had to let Kathleen go, this is why he'd agreed in the first place.' He knew she'd had help crafting her argument. It had worked so well it had taken him a few days to remember what looked so familiar about the handwriting on Kathleen's notepad. The second thought was that he had screwed up again with Olivia, shoving his foot even farther in his mouth. 'Of course she would bring that up. How could she not when he was verbally attacking her for something so benign.' The last thought he had was 'Oh my god, she's going to talk to Cragen.' He stood on the street corner, hands on his head, turning slowing around. The coffee vendor looked at him and said "Don't make her mad. She looks like she means it." He shot the guy a mean look and stomped off.

Olivia used the walk to back to her desk to calm herself down, with Olvetti trailing behind her. She'd noticed him halfway back to their desks and had chosen to ignore the fact that he was either spying, being plain old nosy or was being overprotective. Like hell, she was going to talk to him about this though. She threw her coat on the back of her chair and sat back down, focusing on her computer screen. Olvetti sat down across from her and opened his mouth to say something, but when Olivia's head shot up and she glared at him, he closed it and went back to his work. He hadn't seen much evidence of her reputation as Bad Ass Benson, he'd figured maybe she'd outgrown it over the years, but seeing her shouting toe to toe with a man who easily had 6 inches and 70 pounds on her had changed his mind.

He'd wisely left her alone and she'd calmed down by mid-afternoon. She'd gotten an email from Kathleen Stabler giving her a heads up that her dad was pissed and more than likely knew about their conversation the other day. She'd smiled at the belated warning, thinking Elliot Stabler had a lot of problems, but his kids were not the ones that should be keeping him up at night.

By the end of the week, Olivia was exhausted. The fight with Elliot had thrown her back onto the edge, she wasn't sleeping well, when she was sleeping at all. The nightcap that used to push her over into an exhausted sleep no longer was doing the job, but she adamantly refused to have more than one, or to use any of the prescription sleep aids she had laying around from previous well-meaning doctors. She knew she wasn't eating enough to maintain her weight, but really didn't care at this point. She wanted this case to be over, and she wanted Elliot Stabler to keep out of her head. She had a feeling the case would be over and done long before the other issue was resolved.

She walked into the squadroom with a large coffee in her hand after another sleepless night, catching a concerned look from Olvetti. He didn't say anything, for which she was glad. He could worry all he wanted as long as he kept it to himself.

He walked over and set a wrapped bagel with cream cheese and tomato on her desk. She looked at him and was going to protest but he beat her to the punch. "Look Benson, you are less maintenance than any other partner I've ever had. This..." he gestured between the two, "This, I think, is working. So, if I have to feed you in order to make sure you eat, it's worth it. If only to avoid getting a whole new partner again." That was the truth. His new partner was a hardworker. She was tireless, fought for what was right, got her work done, kept him entertained during the long days and did it all without being a gigantic pain in his ass. If all he had to do to keep her going, if not keep her happy, was make sure she ate now and then, he could totally do that. He saw now what Munch was referring to. She looked good, she always did, but he could see circles under her eyes and her step was missing her normal energy. This case was getting to her.

She snorted at his comments, but mumbled some thanks and started to eat the bagel. He always squished his compliments in between either insults or complaints; it was just his way.

By mid-afternoon it was clear that they were going to be able to wrap up the Lassley case. The boy had admitted to abuse at the hands of his father, the mother had found out a week before the father was killed. Unable to pay for a lawyer and unwilling to trust the system to keep him away from her son, she had paid a hit man to kill him. The sun was low in the sky, a hazy orange light shining on the streets before they got the warrants to arrest them both, uniformed officers and someone from ACS were meeting them at the apartment to arrest Angela Lassley. The boy would have to be placed in a foster home.

"Poor kid will probably be better off," Olvetti was saying as they drove to the Lassley's apartment. "Crazy, drunk mother like that, at least the kid might have a chance growing up normal in foster care. He doesn't need to see that and try to take care of all that dysfunction."

Olivia sighed, thinking that she had to say something back. Her silence would be more telling than a bland comment. "I'm sure she loves him in her own way, she's just too sick to take care of him properly."

"Well, look at you, former SVU cop defending the abuser," he ribbed her good-naturedly, blissfully unaware of the hornet's nest he was stepping into.

"I'm not defending her." Olivia tried to keep her voice calm and steady, and tried to keep her thoughts focused on this case, not on her own miserable childhood with an alcoholic mother. "I just think probably deep down she wants to do right by her kid, she's just really bad at it."

"Either way, the kid should be glad to be rid of her."

"She's still his mother, Gary. A mother who is going to jail for trying to protect her son, even if it was completely illegal, and even if she is a drunk." Olivia wished he would drop it. She did NOT want to be talking about this now, not when they were about to step into that apartment. That situation was going to be difficult enough.

"Yeah, but..."

Olivia cut him off harshly. "Enough Olvetti." She had a mean edge to her voice, one that he hadn't heard before. He shrugged and settled down into the passenger seat, leaving it for now.

Both officers shot to attention as they rounded the corner onto the Lassley's street and saw a small commotion outside the apartment building. Instead of one squad car with a couple of uniforms to assist in the arrest, there were two squad cars, the second with lights on, parked haphazardly in the street. A woman that looked like the social worker was talking on the phone, pacing in front of the building. One of the uniforms was talking on the radio and they heard their car radio crackle. Ignoring it, but jumping out the car as soon as they parked, they walked up to the officer on the radio.

"Oh, glad you are here Detectives. We have a situation." The young officer went on to explain that they'd been waiting outside for the detectives when Angela Lassley arrived home outside her building, dragging her son by the arm. She'd clearly been drinking, they could smell the booze on her, but she was walking fine and barely slurring her words. She'd seen the officers and ignored them until she had been in the doorway, when she had turned and started yelling at them, screaming that they weren't going to take her, or her son, that she was only doing what she had to and the police should know what's best and leave them alone. She'd slammed the old wooden door in the officers' faces and by they time they'd gotten into the building, she was locked in her apartment with the boy.

The two detectives shared a glance, reassured the officer that sometimes these things happen and headed towards the apartment. Olivia knocked on the door and called out. She was surprised when she saw Colin's shaggy hair appear behind the door chain.

"My mom says to go away, you can't come in," he said, looking at her with eyes that broke her heart. Whatever her thoughts on his mother's, and her mother's alcoholism, he did not deserve to have to defend his mother.

"Well, Colin, the thing is that a judge says that we can, that we have to come in and talk to you mother. So she needs to let us in. Can we talk to her?" Olivia tried to convince the boy while at the same time calming him down. The look on his face told her it was not working. They heard some crashing inside, but Colin didn't move from the door, his head barely hitting the still in place door chain. Both detectives tried to see inside to see what was happened, but couldn't see anything amiss. Suddenly Colin was jerked backwards from the door and the door slammed closed in their faces. They heard yelling but couldn't make out the words. Then, just as suddenly the door flew open again and Angela Lassley stood in front of them. Colin was behind her, crying, his tshirt stretched and almost torn, a red handprint on his face.

The woman had blood shot eyes, but spoke in a clear voice when she told them they had no business there and in no uncertain terms told them to get lost. When they explained that they had a warrant for her arrest she opened the door further and allowed them to see the handgun she had in her right hand. She pushed her son backwards into the room, screaming that they wouldn't go with them, to leave her family in peace. Colin scrambled backwards against the wall, shaking. The detectives pulled their guns and entered the apartment, scanning quickly to take in the scene. The boy was shaking, but appeared unharmed up against the living room sofa. Angela Lassley stood against the perpendicular wall, swinging the gun wildly. Her eyes darted, panicked across the room.

Olivia's thoughts went immediately to the boy. He needed out of there. The woman was screaming like a madwoman, she was clearly intoxicated. She was threatening to shoot.

Colin started yelling as well. His small voice surprisingly loud "Don't shoot her. Don't shoot my mom. She's drunk, she doesn't mean it. She doesn't mean it. She's sick."

"Shut up you little bastard! You'll turn out just like him! I'm not going to let anyone else have you. You are mine. You are the reason I'm going to jail and I am not going let them take you!"

Olivia cringed inwardly when she heard those words. Eyes still focused on the scene, her emotions were dangerously close to the surface with this case. Olvetti talked to the woman in a calm, nonchalant manner, trying to convince her to put down the good. The woman swung her shaking arms pointing the gun towards her son, who was begging her to stop.

"Please, Ma. I'll be good, just stop." Then directed at the detectives, "Just leave us alone, come back when she's not sick anymore. She doesn't mean it. She loves me."

"I told you to shut up!" She swung wildly again towards the boy and the gun went off, striking the wall just to the boy's left. Olivia reacted out of instinct, firing her gun once towards the crazed woman, striking her in the arm holding the gun, which she immediately dropped. Olvetti rushed to grab her, Olivia went to the boy as the uniforms rushed into the room, calling for an ambulance and relating what had happened to the backup outside.

Taking in the apartment as the social worker talked to the boy, Olivia noticed an almost empty bottle of vodka sitting next to a shattered glass in a pool of clear liquid. The woman had continued to drink even as she knew the police were outside waiting to arrest her. She sighed and rubbed her eyes, watching the medics attend to the bleeding woman. The screams stopped and she vaguely wondered if she had killed the woman. She heard the boys cries and the drunk woman's yells. 'I won't let anyone else have you.' 'She's sick, she's sick.' Olivia rubbed her eyes harder, she could feel herself starting to shake. Suddenly Olvetti was next to her, pulling her by the elbow.

"Come on, let's go outside." He said quietly. She resisted for a minute and then relented when she caught a whiff of the vodka on the counter.

She knew she'd have to give her statement. She wanted to get that over with and go home. She doubted anyone would argue with letting her off early today. Olvetti led her out of the apartment building and towards the corner, away from some of the chaos that surrounded the building. Olivia was saying as they walked "That woman was so drunk, Gary. She was plastered. I didn't want to shoot her, she was out of her mind."

"I know. You didn't have a choice, she fired a gun at her own child. You had to, drunk or not, in her right mind or not," he reassured her, taking in her appearance. Olivia was still trembling slightly, a little pale, but she had a determined tilt to her jaw that he found slightly reassuring. "This isn't your first rodeo, is it kid? You've been in a shooting before?" he asked her. He'd read her jacket but didn't remember the details. He was certain there were more than one, and he thought he remembered at least one kill. Her reaction was curious for an experienced cop, but he guessed shooting someone hit everyone a little bit differently. He wondered if this case in particular had anything to do with her reaction. She shook her head no, indicating it wasn't her first shooting. He went on, trying to calm her down "It was a good shot, you did good. I don't know how you guys dealt wtih the kids over there is SVU. That's too rough for me. There's a reason I work Homicide, dead victims are easier."

Olivia sighed "Yeah, but the dead bodies are never the only victims; the ones left alive are the ones who suffer." She rubbed her eyes again, thinking of the boy with a dead, abusive father and a drunk, incarcerated mother.

'That understanding,' Olvetti thought, 'was what made Olivia Benson such a good detective. Her empathy was what was going to destroy her.' He stood with her, simply waiting with her on the street corner, knowing they had a long night ahead of them.

She still had her head down, fingers on her temples when Olvetti heard commotion down the street, he looked up just in time to see a car careening out of control, heading towards them. He heard the whining screech of metal as the car sideswiped another car and then watched in horror as it barreled right for them. Jumping and hurling himself to the side, he grabbed Olivia's arm and flung her ahead of him, out of the path of the car. He felt his arm sting as the passenger side mirror hit him. He watched as things moved too fast for him to react, as the bumper of the car clipped Olivia's side, spinning her around and increasing her momentum, sending her headfirst into the brick building behind them. The old, blue sedan came to a crunching halt bent around a lightpole 10 feet away. Olvetti picked himself up off the ground, swearing at his arm, bleeding briskly from a cut along the bicep. In the chaos and screams, he looked around, desperately searching for his partner.

He turned around and saw her crumpled in a pile against the building, unconscious and bleeding from her temple, head slumped at a funny angle against her shoulder.


	11. Chapter 11

Slap: Chapter 11

_She still had her head down, fingers on her temples when Olvetti heard a commotion down the street, he looked up just in time to see a car careening out of control, heading towards them. He heard the whining screech of metal as the car sideswiped another car and then watched in horror as it barreled right for them. Jumping and hurling himself to the side, he grabbed Olivia's arm and flung her ahead of him, out of the path of the car. He felt his arm sting as the passenger side mirror hit him. He watched in horror, things moving too fast to react, as the bumper of the car clipped Olivia's side, spinning her around and increasing her momentum, sending her headfirst into the brick building behind them. The old, blue sedan came to a crunching halt bent around a lightpole 10 feet away. Olvetti picked himself up off the ground, swearing at his arm, bleeding briskly from a cut along the bicep. _

_In the chaos and screams, he looked around, desperately searching for his partner. He saw her crumpled into a pile against the building, unconscious and bleeding from her temple, head slumped at a funny angle against her shoulder. _

Suddenly Olvetti was joining the people yelling, himself screaming into his radio "Officer down! Ped vs Auto. Officer down, corner of 9th and 31st." His breath hitched as he scrambled towards Olivia, who still lay unmoving. "Oh, god! Olivia!" he yelled. The scene buzzed around him, he didn't hear anything else going on around him as he reached her side. Not wanting to move her too much, he looked her up and down. Her head was bleeding, but he didn't see any other injuries on her. He shook her lightly, calling her name. He was pushing on her neck, trying to find a pulse when he felt her stir. He stopped and called her name again. "Olivia! Open your eyes!" he demanded, willing her to wake up.

She stirred again and lifted her head, her eyes fluttering open and then closing tight, forehead creased with pain. She moaned slightly as she shifted position slightly.

"Come on, girl, open your eyes for me," he urged again. He rested her head back against the brick wall and she opened her eyes slowly. She squinted and he saw her forehead crease with pain again as she looked at him. She blinked a few times as if clearing the cobwebs from her eyes.

"There you go," Olvetti said as she focused on him. "Good girl."

"What happened?" she murmured, her words slightly muffled.

"There was a car, it jumped the sidewalk. Do you remember?" he asked her. "Don't try to move yet," he told her, as she started to shift again.

"Yeah, I think so..." she spoke slowly, as if her tongue wouldn't cooperate inside her mouth. "It was a Lincoln. Blue."

He felt a wave of relief wash over him. "That's my girl...almost gets run over but still has time to notice the car was a crummy American model..."

She moved again and winced as her head throbbed. "Shit, Gary..."

"It's okay. Hold on. Does it hurt anywhere else? Your neck, back?" She felt his hands running over her neck, back, legs.

"Stop feeling me up, Olvetti. I think I'm okay. You're bleeding," she said, noticing his bloody sleeve. Her speech was slow, but a little clearer. She moved slightly and he moved to help her up when he heard her groan and her breath hitch. All of a sudden she was bent over on her side, vomiting onto the ground. He let go of her arm and held her shoulders.

When she stopped retching he eased her back against the wall again. "Okay, hold on, we'll just wait for the bus." She looked a little pale, lying with her head tilted back. She vomited once more while they were waiting for the ambulance, groaning as the pain coursed from her head through the rest of her body when her abdomen clenched reflexively.

She laid back and closed her eyes again, the darkness helping her pain.

"Benson, come on, stay with me!" she heard Olvetti calling her. He sounded far away. She struggled to open her eyes again and struggled to speak.

"I didn't want to, Gary," she said, in a foggy-voice. "I really didn't want to. She was so drunk. I couldn't help it." Olvetti patted her awkwardly on the shoulder, looking up the street for the ambulance. Olivia went on, she was starting to slur her words again. "She was going to cut me, I had to. I didn't want to hurt her." That made Olvetti look back at the woman lying on the ground, she was awake, but her eyes looked unfocused. "She had a broken bottle, she was going to cut me. I had to, but I didn't want to. She said no one else could have..." she stopped talking for a minute as she dry-heaved again and groaned. "She didn't mean it." Tears leaked out of the corner of her eyes, either from the retching or the scene inside. Olvetti couldn't tell which.

"She had a gun. She fired. You didn't have a choice. Hey, hey, look at me!" He was trying to get her to focus on him, but she kept closing her eyes.

"She didn't have a gun, she never touched a gun in her life, didn't like it that I did. It was the broken bottle, she came at me, was going to cut me. I swear."

Olvetti breathed a sigh of relief as the EMTs and his Captain showed up simultaneously. She was getting more and more confused, mumbling about a broken bottle and retching every few minutes. His heart was in his throat watching her being loaded onto a stretcher. He distractedly rubbed his hands over his hair. Not even two months and he let's his partner get run over. His captain, Captain Wells, a tall slender black man, stood next to him as he told the medics what he knew. They dove out of the way of the car, it had clipped both of them, he'd been knocked down and then he saw her next to the wall unconscious. She'd woken up after less than 2 minutes he figured, had thrown up multiple times and had been oriented to what had happened but then had gotten progressively more confused. They'd given him a bandage for his arm and told him to go get it check out; he'd probably earned a few stitches.

Wells took him aside and asked him briefly what had happened inside and he'd given a brief version about Olivia's sharp shot. Wells told him Angela Lassley was already at the hospital, didn't even have any deep tissue damage. It was about as clean of a shot as you could get. Olvetti nodded, he'd known it.

Captain Wells asked him "How'd she handle it? The shooting."

Olvetti shrugged. "Fine, I guess. She was allright, kinda subdued, but about what you'd expect. Started to fall apart a little bit at the end. I think this case hit harder than most for some reason. But then the car...Who was the driver?" Wells nodded at him, then gestured towards the ambulance about to take off. "Some drunk a-hole, lost control with the lane closures and hit the gas instead of the break. You go ride along," he gestured towards the ambulance, "I'll meet you there."

Wells watched him climb in and the medics shut the door. He'd been watching his new detective closely to see how she handled this case. He hadn't told anyone, but he'd been the Captain who'd been supervising the officers who had found her mother at the bottom of the subway stairs. The young officer had come to him after finding out the woman's daughter was a detective. He'd found out some of the details and then directed the officer to the 1-6 to inform her captain. He'd never mentioned it to her, figured she didn't need to know, but he'd filed that information away. He figured this case would be tough on her, and he'd been right. He'd also been extraordinarily proud of how she'd handled it. He nodded to himself as the ambulance drove away and turned to the scene to sort out the mess.

In the back of the ambulance, Olivia was becoming more and more restless. She kept pulling off the oxygen mask, pulling at the IVs the medics were putting in. She would respond to her name but was having some trouble answering questions promptly. Even the most basic questions required a lot of thought. She'd retched a couple more times as they'd moved her, but thankfully they'd given her some sort of medication that had helped. The medics had directed him to keep her distracted, keep her interested and awake. They'd asked she had any family and he'd told them he didn't know.

He swore inwardly at himself, how could he not know something so important. He tried to remember if she'd ever mentioned any family and was drawing a blank.

"Hey, Olivia. Olivia look at me." She struggled to open her eyes and focus, face wracked with pain, she tried to sit up again, pulling at her lines and retched convulsively, her stomach now empty. He saw tears leaking out of her eyes again. "I didn't mean to. She wouldn't stop, she was yelling at me...the whiskey...and the broken glass... I hope she's okay," He tried to reassure her, get her mind off of whatever was confusing her. He was pretty sure she wasn't talking about Angela Lassley, it'd been vodka, and there was certainly no threat of being cut by a bottle.

"Hey, now, Olivia...Is there anyone you want me to call?"

She stopped for a second and he started to get nervous that she was losing consciousness again when suddenly she said, "Call Elliot. Please, call him."

"Elliot Stabler? Yeah, okay, we'll find him." Interesting choice, he thought to himself. He knew there was something else going on there.

"No, call Cragen. Cragen will tell him. Call him instead."

"Okay, Benson, you got it, as soon as we get there. You just hang on." Olivia groaned as the ambulance hit a serious of potholes and it jiggled them all around.

The medic turned to Olivia and asked "Hey there, Ms Benson! Look at me."

She turned her head and tried to focus on the chubby Latino medic. "Good! Good. Now, what's your name?" She closed her eyes. 'Why wouldn't they leave her alone? Olvetti could tell them her name.' She felt the medic shake her lightly, "Come on, answer! What's your name?"

"Olivia Benson Number Four Oh One Five" she replied groggily.

"Good, okay," the medic replied. "Now, what city are we in?"

Olivia closed her eyes and groaned again, inwardly she was getting irritated with Olvetti. He was there, she thought, why didn't he answer their stupid questions and why the hell didn't these medics know what city they were in.

"Come on, Liv, just answer them" she heard Olvetti plead.

"New York."

"Okay, good. Now what month is it?"

"Olvetti," she said questioningly, "You tell them. Why don't they know? What's wrong with them? God! It hurts! Tell them to drive slower."

The older detective swallowed a chuckle, he looked at the medic who replied "Well, we'll just say she's oriented."

They pulled into the back of the Emergency Room at Mercy Hospital and Olvetti tried to stay out of the way as the doctors swarmed the gurney as they rolled her inside. A young Latina doctor with black glasses came out and asked him a few questions and he swore inwardly again about how little he'd found out about his new partner. She had explained they were sending her for a Cat Scan to look at her brain, but that she was okay right now. He thanked her and pulled out his cell phone and called his precinct, trying to find someone who could get him the number of a Captain Cragen at the 1-6.

At the 1-6, Elliot was sitting at his desk checking his messages and was about to get up and join Fin in one of the interrogation rooms. As he started walking away, Cragen opened his office, ear stuck to the phone and pointed at him, waving him inside his office. He had a very worried look on his face. Elliot's heart was pounding, his stomach sinking into the floor as he made his way across the room. He hadn't truly thought that Olivia would call Cragen after their fight today. He was full of regret and self-hatred.

Cragen held the door open for him and gestured for him to sit. He was finishing up his conversation. He had a formal tone to his voice. Maybe it wasn't Olivia after all.

"Allright, I understand. I'll let him know. Thank you for calling."

He snapped closed his phone and stood in front of Elliot, leaning his backside against the desk.

"That was a Detective named Gary Olvetti." Elliot's head snapped up.

"Benson's partner? Why is he calling?" Elliot questioned.

Cragen cut him off "You've met him?"

"Just briefly, ran into him and Liv a week or so ago. Why's he calling here?"

"Elliot, there was some kind of incident. An arrest gone bad, shot's were fired."

Elliot swore he felt the blood rush out of his head. His heart was pounding into his throat. 'oh no oh no oh no' The thoughts were rushing into his head. 'Something horrible has happened and I wasn't there, I wasn't there because I am a jerk, an unstable person and the last words I said to her were angry.' He didn't say anything, but must have had a look on his face.

"Elliot!" Cragen called, he snapped back to attention.

"Was she hit?" he managed to croak.

"No, you weren't listening. No one was hurt badly, but a car went out of control and ran down the officers standing on the sidewalk. He says she's okay right now, but she was asking for you." He gave the detective a pointed look.

Elliot was already on his feet. "Where is she?" he asked, already halfway out the door.

"Mercy. Call me and let me know, Elliot!" Cragen called after him as Elliot ran.


	12. Chapter 12

Slap – Chapter 12

…_a car went out of control and ran down the officers standing on the sidewalk. He says she's okay right now, but she was asking for you." He gave the detective a pointed look. _

_Elliot was already on his feet. "Where is she?" he asked, already halfway out the door. _

_"Mercy. Call me and let me know, Elliot!" Cragen called after him as Elliot ran. _

Olvetti sat on a chair in the hallway of the ER. They had forced him to have a doctor look at his arm. They young doctor had cleaned it out and put 4 stitches in. He had a bandage wrapped around his arm, but it looked better than the torn, bloody sleeve. He sat across from the gurney his partner was lying on, being attended to by a doctor and a nurse who were messing with IV lines and wires. She was still very restless, not following instructions very well, but she wasn't as confused anymore. The doctor said something to the nurse and then waved to Olvetti. He stood up and hurried into the room. The doctor explained to both of them that the CT Scan of her brain looked fine, but they were still worried about bleeding or pressure on the brain that they weren't able to see, considering the vomiting and her agitation, which were both bad signs. Olvetti stood like a statue as the doctor went on to explain that they wanted to do a spinal tap and then an MRI. Olivia had closed her eyes as the doctor was speaking, her hands still fluttering as if she couldn't keep them still, picking up first the blanket and then the IV in her wrist. Gary picked up her hand and held it to keep her from pulling out the IV again.

"Benson," he called. She opened her eyes and struggled to focus on him. She had a giant goose egg and a cut on her head. They had cleaned off the blood, but the swelling was frightening. "Did you hear the doctor? What they want to do?"

"Yeah, I heard. Stick a needle in my back and an MRI. Okay. Just don't make me move, okay?"

"Yeah, okay. Look, do you want me to stay for the spinal tap or wait outside?" She squeezed his hand. She appreciated his support, but she didn't want him in the room for that. She said no, careful not to shake her head no as she said it.

"Okay, I'll be right outside." He gave her hand another squeeze and headed back to his chair.

The doctor pulled the curtain and Olvetti could hear the murmured instructions he was giving. He winced just thinking about what she was having to go through. About 10 minutes later, the doctor came out and approached him.

"You know, she is not really cooperating very well. The agitation, restlessness, distraction, forgetfulness. It's pretty common with head injuries. We're probably going to have to sedate her for the MRI, just wanted to give you a head's up. She'll be pretty out of it for a while."

Olvetti nodded at him and sat back down. He glanced down the hall where the driver of the car was being treated. The jerk had gotten away with barely a scratch on him. Besides Olivia, a uniformed officer had been hit and had a broken leg and one other bystander had fallen and gotten banged up a bit. He was staring again at the curtain hiding his partner when he saw Elliot Stabler hurrying down the hall. He stood and gave a wave, catching his attention. Stabler changed direction and headed for him. He stood and extended a hand, which Elliot shook distractedly.

"Where is she?" he asked. Olvetti gestured with his chin towards the curtain.

Elliot turned and headed for the curtain and then paused when Olvetti reached out and grabbed his arm, wincing as the movement put pressure on the fresh cut.

"Hey, man, she's okay, I think. Banged up and pretty confused though." He let the man go when he saw he'd slowed down a little, he didn't want the guy barging in an scaring the crap out of her.

On the gurney behind the curtain, Olivia heard familiar voices. Through the fog, she tried to place them and couldn't, grimacing with the effort. She heard the curtain being pulled back, but didn't open her eyes, her forehead creased with pain.

"Hey, Liv." She heard a familiar voice speaking the words quietly. It felt like time was moving in slow motion. She tried to place the voice and she felt someone patting her arm. Finally it dawned on her. Elliot.

She opened her eyes a crack and tilted her head the slightest amount to allow her to see him. He saw her movement and grabbed her hand.

"Hey there..."

"Elliot..." she managed to squeak out.

"How're you feeling?" he asked quietly.

"Like shit," she replied, closing her eyes again.

"Olvetti said you got hit by a car?" he asked, figuring the question would help him ascertain how confused she was.

"No," she said, her eyes still closed. "I got hit by a brick wall." Her voice was slightly groggy, as if she'd just been woken from a deep sleep. "I have bad luck with partners," she mumbled. "The first one slaps me and the second throws me into a brick wall. Well, I guess it was better than a Lincoln." She opened her eyes again and looked at her partner seriously. Elliot noticed a strange look come over her face. "You know I didn't want to, right? Hit her, I mean. The woman was drunk, El and she was coming at me with a bottle." She laid back again and closed her eyes, moving her legs and scratching at the hand with the IV. Elliot grabbed her hand and held it still as she pulled against him, eyes closed with pain still etched on her face. Well, she knew which way was up, but she wasn't talking much sense. He'd have to ask Olvetti what she was talking about. The doctor came in with another couple of people, hospital staff of some sort and started disconnecting wires and tubes.

The young doctor with the glasses put her head down near Olivia's and said quietly "Hey, we're going to take you for more pictures of your head, okay? You just lie still." She looked up at Elliot and nodded with a small smiled and then they were whisking her down the hallway, leaving him and Olvetti to stare at each other.

The two men sat in the uncomfortable plastic chairs in the hallway, staring in the direction the gurney had gone. After several minutes, Elliot asked, "So what happened?"

"Ah, man, whadda mess. It was just supposed to be a simple arrest, CPS was there to take the kid..." he drifted off, recollecting in his head all the things that had gone wrong that day.

"So we get there and this lady was drunk, man. She was totally plastered and she's got herself locked in her apartment with a gun and this poor kid." Olvetti shook his head at the memory. Just as he was about to speak again, Casey Novak strode up to them.

"Elliot! Oh my god! How is she?" she demanded, breathlessly, looking at the two men with wide eyes. Her hair was windblown and her suit rumpled. Elliot had rarely seen the competent lawyer look so frenzied.

"She's okay, we think. They took her for an MRI." Elliot grabbed her shoulder reassuringly.

She nodded and swallowed. "Mark Rufford told me. Someone called him and told him his arrest had gone bad, perp had shot at the cops and then a drunk driver ran over one of the detectives." She said it as a question, asking them for confirmation. Elliot looked at Olvetti, who then continued...

"Yeah, so this lady is totally drunk and she pulls a gun on us. She's swinging it around like it's a toy and it goes off, pointed right at this kid, who's screaming at us not to kill him mom. Benson takes the shot, great shot ya know." His Brooklyn accent was getting thicker as the night went on. "Hit the lady right in the shooting arm. I took her outside after, she was a little shook up, you know, like you get..." Elliot was giving him a blank look, the Olivia he knew didn't get shook up, certainly not for shooting a perp that was putting a kid in danger. Casey was hanging on Olvetti's every word, her mouth open in astonishment.

"So then we're standing there on the corner of 9th Avenue and Benson's giving me some story about how she didn't want to shoot the drunk and all of a sudden this car comes out of nowhere straight for us. I pulled her out of the way, but the car clipped both of us. She ends up taking a header into the building behind us." He finishes the story and rolls his shoulders back and rubs the back of his neck.

"She kills me, that one," he says of Olivia, Brooklyn voice full of emotion. "When she finally wakes up I ask her if she remembers what happened and you know what she says?" He didn't wait for an answer. "She say, 'Yeah, I remember. It was a Lincoln...'" He shook his head. "She's too much, this one! Don't know how you let her go..." he said, looking at Elliot.

Elliot mumbled something unintelligible and looked down.

Casey was still hanging on his every word. "So she's okay?"

"Yeah, I think so...I dunno...she started puking and then started not making sense. The doctors are worried that she's all confused and agitated because of bleeding or swelling in her brain. They say the MRI will tell us for sure."

He sat himself back down and hung his head, elbows on his knees. "Ah, man, she was scaring the crap out of me." The man looked distraught. Elliot sat down next to him as they waited. Olvetti started running on. "She was scaring me, man. The dry heaving and she's going on and on about how she didn't want to shoot the drunk woman, how she didn't want to, said there wasn't a gun, but that she had a broken glass bottle and was going to cut her. She kept saying 'but she was drunk, she didn't mean it' and I'm saying to her 'no, she meant it, she fired a gun at her own kid' and she keeps insisting that there wasn't a gun and that she was going to cut her with a bottle. I dunno man...she got her bell rung bad. Does any of that make sense to you? Maybe an old case or something?" He looked up at Elliot and Casey.

Elliot was just shaking his head, "Nah, no, doesn't sound familiar."

Casey was still standing with her mouth open wide eyed. Suddenly she jerked slightly and closed her mouth. Always perceptive, Olvetti pounced. "That means something to _you_! What was she talking about?" Casey shrugged her shoulders back, trying to gather herself. She looked at Elliot for help, but he was giving her a blank look as well. She looked back to Olvetti who was looking at her like she had the ability to fix everything.

"Ah, I, I dunno...She must be confused..." she mumbled, avoiding eye contact with either of the men.

"Come on, Casey. What's she talking about?" Elliot pushed.

The redhead didn't reply, but shifted her briefcase to her other hand and went to sit in the chair next to Elliot.

She used the movement to think about what she was going to say. She looked to Elliot. "Remember the Carrie Eldridge case?"

"The teenager who stabbed her mother to death? Yeah, I remember," he replied.

"Did Olivia ever tell you why she got a plea deal?" she questioned, purposefully vague.

"No," he replied dismissively. "I assumed that the defense worked, sympathetic jury wouldn't convict."

"No, we polled the jury. We had a conviction." Casey replied.

"So why di-" Elliot tried to reply.

Casey cut him off, "So she never told you how she knows Simone Bryce?"

"The child rights attorney? No, I figured they'd met on the job." Elliot was looking at Casey, trying to put the pieces together. Olivia'd been upset about that case, drawing strong parallels with her own mother, he thought. Maybe this case was too, from what Olvetti had been saying the woman tonight sounded like a piece of work. It still didn't explain what Liv had been saying though...

Casey sighed and shifted in her seat. She didn't know how to get out of this one.

"I pled her out because Olivia asked me to." Casey said quietly. "She'd met Simone Bryce when she was a teenager and Bryce was a law student." She paused to think again about how she was going to tell this. She trusted Elliot, but the jury was still out of Olvetti. She liked the guy, and she thought Olivia did too, but she didn't know how much she had told him about her personal life. 'Well,' she thought 'I guess he's gonna get an earful now.'

She went on "She told me, the night before the hearing, that when she was 16 she'd tried to move in with an older boyfriend. Her mom..." She looked at Olvetti, wondering how much he knew. Knowing Liv, she guessed not much.

She went on, looking at Olvetti. "Her mom was a drunk. An alcoholic and a terrible mother, neglectful...anyway. Her mom...When her mom found out, and she'd been drinking, of course, she dropped the bottle of whatever it was and went after Liv with the broken half. She told me she got away, got out of the apartment, but..."

The three sat there in silence for a moment.

"Well shit." Olvetti said suddenly. "I don't know whether to feel better or worse. At least I know she's not nuts, what she was saying makes perfect sense knowing that story, but damn, that's pretty shitty."

"Yeah, well, she probably wasn't planning on you finding out any of that, so..." Casey went on.

Olvetti looked to Elliot. "Did you know any of that?"

He shrugged. "I knew about her mother, but she never told me that. She always told me her mother never hit her, kept to ignoring her and insults, but she never said anything about that."

The three fell back into silence, waiting. Olvetti was the first to notice the gurney coming back down the hall, pushed by the doctor and another person. He jumped up, as did Elliot and then Casey. They could see her lying still, eyes closed, pale, with the bruise and scrape on her head obvious next to the white of the sheet. She didn't move a muscle as they swung the gurney back into the curtained alcove.

_Tbc _

_Please review. Your comments keep me motivated to create more angst in these people's lives….._


	13. Chapter 13

Slap Chapter 13

_Olvetti was the first to notice the gurney coming back down the hall, pushed by the doctor and another person. He jumped up, as did Elliot and then Casey. They could see her lying still, eyes closed, pale, with the bruise and scrape on her head obvious next to the white of the sheet. She didn't move a muscle as they swung the gurney back into the curtained alcove. _

"She okay? What'd it show?" Elliot asked as they approached the gurney.

"We're still waiting on the results. We'll let you know as soon as we here. We had to sedate her to keep her still enough for the scan; she wouldn't cooperate very well. She's a tough one, had to give her enough benzos to knock out a prizefighter on PCP. She'll be knocked out for a while. We'll move her upstairs as soon as there's a spot available."

The doctor gave them a quick smile and nod and then was gone, leaving them staring at Olivia, looking small under the sheet. Elliot went over and shook her arm gently a few times, calling her name. She didn't move a muscle. It made him nervous, but the machine she was connected to was beeping at a steady, comforting rate. The man that had pushed the gurney back with the doctor, some sort of hospital tech, watched them looking at her and said, "She's not going to wake up for a while, guys. They completely snowed her to get her to lie still. Just leave her for now, she'll wake up in a few hours..."

Elliot pulled up a chair and sat down next to the gurney, looking at the clock: 8:45pm. Olvetti pulled out his phone, looked at Elliot and said "I'm gonna call my wife." He stepped out into the hallway. Casey looked at her friend and gave her hand one last squeeze. "I'm going to get some coffee and sandwiches. Call me if anything changes." She walked down the hall, leaving Elliot alone, staring at the pale face of his former partner.

Olvetti came back a few minutes later, then Casey bearing coffee and sandwiches. Elliot stepped out to call back to the 1-6 and give an update. Another doctor had come by and given them preliminary results that the MRI was okay, there was no bleeding or dangerous swelling. They were hopeful that in the morning, if she was feeling better, she'd be able to go home. They moved her upstairs to a private room on the 5th floor at about midnight. The nurses upstairs were sympathetic, but not sympathetic enough to let them stay overnight. They'd been allowed to stay until she was settled and then were unceremoniously told to leave; they could come back at 8am.

As they efficiently moved her sleeping form around in the bed, hooking her up to new wires and tubes, one of them kindly encouraged them to go, saying she'd be asleep all night anyway and wouldn't know if they were here or not. As if on cue, Olivia stirred, letting out a slight moan as she shifted in the bed. She didn't open her eyes, not even to her name or to the repetitive squeezing of the blood pressure cuff. They left reluctantly as the nurse shooed them from the room.

Olvetti arrived at the hospital at 730am and talked his way up to the nurse's station on the 5th floor. There he found Elliot Stabler arguing furiously with one of the nurses, holding two coffees in his hands. Eventually, one of the nurses from the previous night walked by. Recognizing the two men she'd said "No way. I remember you two. I said 8am. The waiting room is down the hall. Go on, it's only 20 minutes."

Fifteen minutes later they were allowed into her room. Approaching together, Elliot hung back and said "You go on in first, I'll wait here." Olvetti nodded and knocked softly on the door as he cracked it and stuck his head in. Olivia was lying in the bed with her eyes closed, with the head of the bed tilted up towards a sitting position. She didn't respond to the knock, but he entered quietly anyway and walked over to the side of the bed.

"Benson?" he called softly.

Without moving her head, she opened her eyes and looked at him, turning slightly when she recognized him. "Hey, Olvetti," she said with a little smile.

"Welcome back to the land of the living. They drugged the hell out of you last night."

"No kidding."

"How much do you remember?" he asked.

"I remember you throwing me into a brick wall," she said, raising one eyebrow.

"Ah, Olivia, I am so sorry, I didn't mean..I mean..It was an accident..." he stammered.

She smiled at him. "Ah, come Olvetti, I know. Hey, I'll take a brick wall over a Lincoln anyday..."

He chuckled at her in relief. "Do you remember the rest of they day?"

"You mean with the Lassley's?" He nodded and she shifted in the bed and looked down at her hands, becoming very interested in the tape holding her IV. "Yeah, I remember. They're okay? Colin and his mother?"

"Yeah. They're fine. Are you?" He looked at her with discerning eyes. He looked back at him. She felt that he knew something, but was too tired to try and navigate that route.

"Yeah, I will be."

"Benson, it was a good shooting, a clean one. You know that."

"I know."

"You didn't have any other choice. Hell, I wouldv'e done the same thing 3 seconds later, except I wouldn't have shot to disarm. "

"I know."

"You did what you needed to do, drunk mother or not."

She stared at him after that. "I know."

"Do you?"

She didn't answer, but became very interested in the IV again.

He saved them from the silence. "Did they say when they were going to let you out of here?"

She shook her head slowly no, they hadn't told her. "They said they'd come by this morning, but…." She made a face explaining what she thought of waiting…

"So, ah, Stabler's outside, want me to send him in?" Olvetti asked, figuring she'd want to see him.

Her eyebrows creased at that. "He is? How long has he been there?" She remembered asking him to call Cragen and Elliot, but didn't remember him ever showing up. She figured it had all been in her head.

"He was here last night, you don't remember?"

She started to shake her head, then changed her mind and said "No."

"You asked me to call him...Sorry if you didn't want me too, maybe the confusion..." Olvetti was backpedelling, remembering the fight he'd witnessed yesterday. 'Man, that was only yesterday...' he thought.

"No, I remember asking you to. It's okay. I just don't remember him being here." She wrinkled her eyebrows. Why had she asked for him? It must have been the concussion. She pushed her fingers into her eyes. Deep down she knew why she had asked for him: because after everything, he was still her friend, the one person she knew she could depend on. And that fact was killing her from the inside out.

Olvetti just sat beside her for a minute, giving her the time she needed.

Finally he spoke up, "Look, I can tell that you guys were close, maybe still are, I dunno, but…That guy was a wreck last night, man. What'd the hell ju do to him?"

"What the hell did _I _do to _him_?" That guy got everything that he had coming." Olvetti noticed a familiar jut to her jaw. He tilted his head, 'still pissed off about something.'

"Well," he said, "I'm just saying he was a wreck. Obviously he cares about you. Now, you're a knock-out, I know, but he's a married guy and I don't think he's stressed out 'cause he's got the hots for you, though I could see why….Anyway, why are you so pissed at him anyway?"

"It's a long story, Gary…" she went back to rubbing her eyes, the pressure made the rest of her head hurt a little less.

"Hey," he leaned back in the chair, putting his hands behind his head, legs stretched out. "I got time."

"We were partners for a long time," she started. "And then…Look, it's like….There was this…" She sighed a heavy sigh. "I just don't want to tell you all of that right now."

"Yeah, okay, no prob. But look, he's standing outside that door looking like a puppy left outside while it's owner gets some groceries. You gotta decide what you're going to say to him."

"Yeah, okay," she replied, shifting in the bed trying to get comfortable, suddenly realizing that she was just in a flimsy hospital gown and nothing else.

"I'll go distract the Captain and try to find the doctor to spring you from this joint, you talk to Stabler…" He gave her a quick smiled and headed out, while she shifted again and tried to get the blankets around her. Every movement hurt, she was so sore…

Olvetti walked out of the room and nodded to Stabler, who was leaning against the wall still holding two coffee cups, sipping out of one.

Elliot entered the room quietly, feeling relief when he saw her awake and moving with purpose. "Hey there, he said quietly. She looked up as he walked over to the chair next to the bed and sat down, offering her the second cup of coffee, which she took gladly.

"Thanks. Thank you for coming, I…." she meant to go on, to explain that she didn't need him there, that she shouldn't have called him and that he could go, but she was interrupted.

"I figured the only reason you asked for me was because your new guy didn't know how to get your coffee right," he said, and was rewarded with a smile.

"He's alright, just still learning. Um…Gary said you were here yesterday?"

"Yeah, you don't remember?"

She shook her head. "I don't remember anything after the spinal tap." She shuddered a little at the memory.

"Yeah, apparently you scared your partner, mumbling a bunch of nonsense..."

She grimaced at that. Elliot watched her, trying to discern exactly what was going on. He couldn't tell. Even after 10 years, as well as he knew her, she could still hide things when she wanted to. He moved to sit on the bed and took the coffee from her hands, setting on the side table.

"Olivia, what happened yesterday?" he asked.

"I almost got run over, El. Come on!" she replied, exasperated.

"No, Liv, I mean what happened with that case yesterday, and I don't mean the logistics of the case, I mean with the drunk mother." He laid it out on the table.

She took a deep breath before she spoke and when she did her voice was trembling, she avoided looking at him with tears in her eyes. He could still tell. "God, El, it was so horrible. She was so drunk, you could smell her from across the room. She reeked of booze, and the boy was yelling, she was yelling. It was like shooting my own mother."

He reached out to pull her into a hug and all of a sudden something happened that he hadn't seen in over 10 years of partnership.

Olivia Benson fell apart.

He held her as she cried, her sobs making her shoulders shake. Ever quiet, even in her distress she didn't make a lot of noise. After about 5 minutes, her sobs slowing, she lifted her head.

"Oh my god, Elliot. I'm so sorry." She looked down again at her lap and wiped her eyes with her hands.

He gave her a quick squeeze on her shoulder. "Hey, don't be sorry. You're probably due for a breakdown. After all, you did almost get run over. Plus your former partner's a jackass and your current partner threw you into a wall."

She gave him a crooked smile, wiping the tears away again. "God, I don't know what's wrong with me."

"Liv, you have gone through a hundred things in the last 24 hours, any one of which would make a normal person want to cry. Give yourself a break."

She took a deep, shaky breath as she looked away from him, out the window, wanting to avoid eye contact.

"Look, Liv, you should know..." he paused and she looked back at him. This time he looked away, not wanting it to be worse for her. "Yesterday, you weren't making a lot of sense, you were confused, you..."

Olivia could see where this was heading. "What did I say, El, just tell me..."

"You were going on and on about how drunk this lady was, and then you started in about a broken bottle and how she was going to cut you..."

Olivia looked out the window again and shook her head, "I must've been really confused. She didn't have any glass bottle..." She refused to look at him, inwardly willing him to drop it, to chalk it up to getting knocked on the head.

"Olivia, Casey told us. About Carrie Eldridge and Simone Bryce. And your mother."

"Why did she do that?" she asked quietly, not bothering to deny any of it.

"Because we were worried, we thought you'd lost your marbles. Casey...Casey knew and she told us."

"Us...you mean you and Olvetti?" she asked, her voice low. Elliot nodded.

She pursed her lips and nodded, staring out the window again. She still wouldn't make eye contact with him. Elliot was staring at her and all he could see were her big brown eyes and the giant bruise on the side of her head.

"Liv, I'm sorry..."

She shook her head, interrupting him "It's okay, Elliot, don't be sorry. I'm okay."

"No, I mean I'm REALLY sorry. For everything."

She sighed heavily. What was he expecting from her? To say everything was fine, okay, say let's go back to how things were a month ago, a year ago. Things weren't okay and they couldn't go back to how things were.

"I know you're sorry, El. It's just I'm not sure if sorry is going to be enough."

She went on, "I can't go backwards, can't undue things, and neither can you. I shouldn't have asked for you yesterday, that was a mistake." She said it defiantly, yet sadly.

Elliot felt his heart sink at those words. "I'm not asking to undue things, I'm asking…I don't know, Liv. What they hell is going on here?"

"I don't know either, Elliot. What I do know is that I can't be your partner any more; You're NOT my partner anymore, you don't need to be running around, checking on me, _fixing_ me."

"I'm not…I mean…I know…" He paused, then "Yeah….I think you were right. We were starting to not work as partners. I mean, we were good, damn good, the best, but the other stuff, it got to be too much. Liv, I've sat through a lot of therapy in the past month."

He could see her tensing up, shutting down. He knew she did this before getting bad news, it was a way of protecting herself…

"Look, I know I'm not your partner anymore. That guy out there is probably better for you anyway after the things I've done, but look, we can't just throw 10 years away, Liv. We gave up so much for each other…"

"Yeah, things that we shouldn't have. It's over, Stabler. Over. Just go." He glanced over at her. She had her eyes closed, he eyed the giant bruise and scrape on her temple.

His shoulders dropped. "Why did you ask Olvetti to call me?"

She looked at him one last time before looking down again. "Because I was scared and…and I'm alone and I knew you would come." She said it quietly, as if she was ashamed. "I shouldn't have asked you, I'm sorry. Just go, Stabler. I'll be okay." She closed her eyes and laid back on the bed. She barely heard him when he spoke.

"Maybe it's not just you I'm worried about this time." She heard his footsteps slowly fading away.


	14. Chapter 14

**A/N: I think there will probably be only one or two more chapters after this one. I've put these poor people through enough angst and drama, can't keep it going forever. Hope you enjoy…Pls review, it's always appreciated….**

_His shoulders dropped. "Why did you ask Olvetti to call me?" _

_She looked at him one last time before looking down again. "Because I was scared and…and I'm alone and I knew you would come." She said it quietly, as if she was ashamed. "I shouldn't have asked you, I'm sorry. Just go, Stabler. I'll be okay." She closed her eyes and laid back on the bed. She barely heard him when he spoke. _

_"Maybe it's not just you I'm worried about this time." She heard his footsteps slowly fading away. _

Slap Chapter 14

She heard a knock and forced her eyes open again. She saw a face at the window in the door. It was her Captain and an older doctor in a white coat. She tried to smooth down her hair and wiped her eyes one last time. He entered with a doctor.

When Olvetti had left her room, he'd nodded at Elliot, giving him the go ahead to go inside. He'd found his Captain talking to a doctor. The tall man had a dark look on his face. He did NOT want to interrupt that conversation, but felt he had to. He positioned himself where he could catch Captain Wells' eye. He was just out of earshot, but he could tell that the Captain did not like what he was hearing. Finally catching his eye, he waved over the detective. The Captain introduced him to the doctor; he seemed to be in charge of Olivia's care.

"Olvetti, the doctor was just telling me about Benson. Apparently they are worried about some of her blood work. " He gestured to the doctor to explain.

"Ms. Benson took quite a hit to the head. The hematoma is quite impressive, but there wasn't any bleeding or fracture and only minor swelling inside her brain, which is good; we were able to control that with medications. The problem is that the blood work that we sent came back a little bit off." Seeing the look of shock and worry on Olvetti's face, he backed up a little bit. "So the tests we ran were standard tests, the results tell us that Ms. Benson has been fairly undernourished and was quite dehydrated at the time of the incident. Normally in this case, in a healthy adult, we would give her some fluid and tell her to eat better and send her home. In Ms. Benson's case, because of the head injury, we're worried that correcting, or over correcting of the electrolytes would cause additionally swelling, which could then be life threatening. All indications tell us she'll be just fine, but we want to keep her here one more day to monitor closely as we rehydrate her. " The doctor finished up and looked towards the two officers, implying for them to ask questions if they had any.

"So, you're saying she's probably going to be fine, but you have to keep her here one more night because she's a stubborn smart-ass who doesn't take care of herself." Olvetti didn't pull any punches.

"Well," the doctor stalled, "Yeah, I guess that's about right, but I can't call my patient a stubborn smart-ass."

"Even if she is one?" Olvetti asked. Going on, he said "So, who's going to tell her? That person is gonna get their ear chewed off and I don't want it to be me. You're the boss," he looked at Wells. "You do it."

"Wells' brow wrinkled, "Uh, she might take it better coming from you…"

"Uh uh, no way. That's what you get for wanting a promotion…" He'd known Wells for a long time and wasn't going to be bullied by the man who was now his boss.

The doctor spoke up. "I'll tell her, the white coat will keep her from yelling too much, no?" He looked at the two officers, who were both wearing looks that said 'clearly you have never met this woman…you are going to get eaten alive…'

"I'll go with you," Wells said. Better to get this scene over with he thought…

As they headed towards the door, they saw another man leaving Olivia's room, crestfallen, deep lines edged onto his face. He didn't make eye contact as he headed down the hall. Olvetti stood towards the side, loitering. He watched the doctor and his Captain head into the room and his eyes followed Stabler down the hall. 'Come on, man, don't give up,' he urged silently, as the man headed towards the exit. Then he felt a little sense of relief and excitement when he saw the man stop, turn, and head back into the waiting room. 'Attaboy,' he thought.

He heard some raised voices coming from the hospital room, about what he expected, he thought with a smirk. He ambled down the hallway towards the waiting room. He saw Elliot sitting inside, elbows on his knees, face in his hands. Olvetti walked into the room and took a seat opposite him. Elliot was replaying the conversation in his head over and over. 'Can't undue things, gave up things we shouldn't have, shouldn't have called you, don't try to fix me, go. Over. Go. Go.' Somhow he felt that she wasn't talking so much about the hospital as much as she was her life. With that realization, he got angry. Like hell he was going to leave her alone. Ten years. He was an ass, he knew that, but he wasn't giving up ten years of friendship, of a partnership closer than friends, just because he was an ass. He wasn't going to let her do so either. He stood and strode into the hallway. Seeing her door still closed, her turned around and sat back down, a little deflated, but still feeling justly angry.

"You okay, Stabler?" Olvetti asked calmly, he could see the man practically vibrating.

"Ugh!" Elliot exclaimed, standing up and pacing. "That woman… That woman is infuriating. She's impossible! Good luck with her. Maybe you'll have better luck than I did." He flopped back down in the chair in frustration.

"Hey, 10 years man…You must've had a little bit of luck in there," Olvetti replied. He wasn't a total sadist, but he was kind of getting a kick over how upset these two people were getting over each other, when clearly they cared for one another. He definitely didn't understand how complicated things were. He was a simple guy, simple life; one wife, one house, one job and didn't really understand people who had complicated lives, or complicated emotions. "Tell me it wasn't worth it though, huh?" he said.

"Yeah," Elliot replied after a thought. "It was worth it, worth every infuriating moment. I just wish you and I weren't the only one who could see it."

"She'll come around," Olvetti said encouragingly.

"I dunno, I dunno. Not this time, I'm afraid," Elliot replied.

"Well," Olvetti replied, watching the doctor and Wells leave Olivia's room. Neither of them looked happy, he doubted Olivia did either. "She'll be stuck here for one more day, so at least you'll have a captive audience."

"One more day? They're keeping her? Ohh, is she going to be pissed..." Elliot said. "Why? Is she okay?"

"Yeah, sounds mostly precautionary to me, something about not wanting to cause more swelling as they rehydrated her or something."

"Phew, she is going to hate that," Elliot said with a grimace. His thoughts scattered as they sat and waited. 'What was he doing there? Trying to _fix_ his former partner? Trying to play a role he didn't have any more?' He thought about why she said she had asked for him. She was alone, and she knew he would come. He realized again what a horrible thing he had done to her. He knew he was the only example Olivia had for a male relationship in her life and he had effectively shown her she couldn't rely on him either, leaving her without the friend and partner she had come to rely on. It was as horrible a thing as he had ever done and the realization still killed him inside. She was pushing him away because she felt she could no longer trust him, he wasn't letting her because he couldn't live with the fact that he had let her down in such a significant way.

'Well,' he thought, 'she was still mad, or hurt, enough that she didn't want him there, but he wasn't going along with that.' He could however, do something about her saying she was alone without him. He pulled his phone out and made a couple of calls.

Olvetti was still sitting in the other chair. He pretended to be not very interested in everything Stabler was doing but he couldn't help but be curious about what the guy was going to do. He wondered what they'd talked about this morning.

He stopped daydreaming when Elliot started speaking into the phone. "Hey Casey, it's Elliot. Yeah, yeah, I'm here...Yeah, she's okay. Much better today...No, they're keeping her one more day...Well, I haven't talked to her since they told her, but I am sure she's pissed... Look, can you do me a favor?" He asked her to swing by the hospital and pick up his spare keys to Olivia's apartment (Olvetti couldn't help but think it was interesting that he had a spare key to her place) and pick up some clothes for her so she didn't have to sit in a hospital gown. "I'm going to ask the guys to come by later too and I'm sure she'd rather be dressed...Yeah, okay...I'll be here...Thanks." He hung up and the dialed again.

"Hey Cap. Yeah, later...Yeah, probably not until tomorrow...Casey said the same thing." He went on to tell his boss that Benson was bored, irritated about having to stay and generally looking for any distraction and asked if they would mind stopping by. Olvetti could tell by Elliot's reaction that the response on the other end was positive. "Yeah," Elliot went on. "I think around 11, Novak said she'd be here around then. Okay." He hung up the phone with a snap.

So Elliot was arranging visitors and entertainment, Olvetti thought. I guess the current partner's chopped liver. He did appreciate though how this group of individuals seemed to gather round for their colleague, or rather, former colleague. He was getting the impression that no one at the 1-6 thought of Olivia Benson as a 'former colleague'.

Olvetti stuck his head out the door and saw Wells and the gray-haired doctor talking outside Olivia's room. They both had grim expressions on their faces. Wells said something to the doctor and he smiled. Olvetti went to meet them as they walked down the hallway. "How'd it go?" he asked.

Wells looked at him with a smirk. "How do you think it went, Olvetti? That detective has a well-earned reputation. She threw a huge fit until I told her that if she left this hospital today neither worker's comp or her insurance would cover the medical bills."

Olvetti grinned. "Don't I know it. She up to visitors?" he asked.

The doctor spoke, "I suppose so, although I must say it's at your own risk."

Olvetti grinned again. "Yes, sir." Leaving Elliot to his own devices and brooding, he headed down the hallway to his partner's room.

He knocked on the door and opened the door a crack, peeking his head around. He saw Olivia sitting on the bed, legs crossed, staring at the window. She didn't look like she'd heard his knock, so he'd knocked again.

Olivia had heard his first knock, but used the spare minute to collect herself before turning when she heard the second knock.

"Feel like company?" her partner asked, walking in the door and closing it softly behind him.

"I am sure that I'm terrible company right now, but be my guest." She gestured towards the chair the hospital provided sitting next to the bed.

"Wells tells me they're keeping you here for one more day?" It was less a question and more him explaining that he knew. "I told you ya shoulda eaten more." She shot him a look so dark he was surprised he was still upright.

"You want me to get you anything while you're here?" he offered.

She shook her head slowly, "Nah, I'll be fine, just need to suffer through it. It's only 24 hours..." She looked down at her hands, sitting in her still crossed legs. He thought she looked...sad. It was a look he'd never seen on her before. He wondered again what she and Stabler had fought about yesterday and then today.

"Okay, well let me know. Anything you want, I'll getcha. Hey, Benson?" He asked quietly.

She looked up at him.

"You okay?" he asked.

He could see her physically pulling herself together, putting her shell back on. She stretched her legs, ran her fingers through her hands and sat up straight. "Yeah, fine Olvetti, considering." Her tone changed, he thought for sure it was for his benefit. "So, are you going to entertain me today or what?"

Sensing that she didn't want to talk about anything serious, like whatever the hell she and Stabler had discussed, he regaled her with tales of old cases, the crazy things cops in New York all had tall tales about. Around 11:15am there was another knock on the door. They looked over and saw Casey Novak's red head sticking in the doorway.

"Up for more company?" her alto voice rang out. "I come bearing gifts." She placed onto the bed a bag that held a couple of changes of clothes and some toiletries from Olivia's apartment. "I got the key from Elliot," she said, answering the question before it was asked. Olivia nodded and looked at the bathroom.

"Are you allowed out of bed?" Casey asked, knowing what her friend was thinking.

"They didn't say no," Olivia replied. She swung her legs over the edge of the bed, slightly self-conscious that she had nothing on under the gown except a pair of underwear. She sat slowly on the side and then stood up. Casey stood next to her, looking like she was prepared to catch her if she fell. "I'm okay, Case, thanks," she said as she lost her balance for a second. Casey grabbed at her keeping her upright. "Yeah, sure. That wall did a number on you, Liv. Are you sure the Cadillac wouldn't have been a better bet?"

"It was a Lincoln," both Olivia and Olvetti replied unanimously.

"Whatever." Casey shook her head as she helped Olivia make her way slowly to the small bathroom.

In her own clothes and having brushed her teeth, she felt like a whole new person. Making her way slowly back to the bed, she sighed as she climbed awkwardly back in. Casey was occupying Olvetti's former seat, looking through some files.

"Gary went to get some lunch," Casey said simply, setting the files aside.

"Casey, I heard...I heard that you told Elliot and Olvetti about Simon Bryce...my mother..." Olivia said.

"Olivia, I'm sorry about that, I know you probably didn't want them to know, but you were so out of it and Olvetti was practically pissing his pants thinking you'd gone off your rocker. I-"

"It's okay, Casey, that's what I was going to say. Olvetti, he won't give me a hard time about it, and Elliot..." she drifted off a little, "Well, it's nothing that's going to change his opinion of me at this point. One more nail in the coffin..."

Casey furrowed her brow. "Olivia, what happened between you and Elliot?"

"Casey..." she rubbed her eyes, not wanting to discuss it.

"Liv, it's not going to get any easier to discuss, now is as good of a time as any."

"I was thinking more along the lines of after a double whiskey or two... I dunno Casey, I think we, I, got too dependent, and we couldn't work like that, not responsibly, and then we had this argument...It's better this way in the long run anyway."

"What's better in the long run?" Casey asked, pushing her friend. "Leaving your friend moping out in the hallway all day instead of letting him actually BE your friend. He's not your partner, but after 10 years Liv, he's got to mean something."

"It's not that he doesn't mean anything, it's more the oppo- Wait, what do you mean in the hallway? He's still here?" she asked, incredulous.

"Yeah, been camped out in the waiting room all morning." Casey was confused as to why she didn't know he was there.

"I told him to leave hours ago," she said.

"Yeah, well, he didn't and you should probably find out why..." the redhead said pointedly as she gathered her things.

"I know why he's still here," Olivia said darkly, "because he's an overbearing ass who thinks he needs to look after me, even though I'm not his responsibility anymore."

Casey sighed, "Olivia, you weren't ever his responsibility. Not even when you were partners, did he think you were his responsibility. He thought you were his friend... I'm due back in court. I'll stop by later tonight." She gathered her things and stepped out into the hallway, shaking her head. Those two were never going to get their heads screwed on straight.


	15. Chapter 15

_Casey sighed, "Olivia, you weren't ever his responsibility. Not even when you were partners, did he think you were his responsibility. He thought you were his friend... I'm due back in court. I'll stop by later tonight." She gathered her things and stepped out into the hallway, shaking her head. Those two were never going to get their heads screwed on straight. _

Chapter 15

As Casey walked down the hall, she saw Cragen walking towards her. She pointed the way towards Olivia's room and explained she was due in court and hurried off. The bald captain made his way into the room of his old detective. She was surprised, and at little embarrassed, to see him. He made some cracks about how he'd gotten her into some tight spots, but had never actually let her get run over. They chatted a little bit about Homicide and how things were back at the 1-6 before Olvetti came back bearing sandwiches, with Munch at his side. Cragen gave his apologies and left, wondering briefly where Stabler was. He'd gotten the day off and the Captain had just assumed he'd be at the hospital. It was curious that he wasn't there, but didn't have time to dwell on it.

Olvetti and Munch entertained Olivia for most of the afternoon. By late afternoon, they had left and she was chafing under the restrictions of the hospital. She was desperate to get home. She finally convinced the nurse that she should be allowed to walk in the hallway, as long as she agreed to not run off in the middle of the night in return. Olivia thought perhaps the nurse still didn't trust her not to, but she was content for now with the freedom to wander in circles around the floor.

She was completing her first loop when she passed the waiting room and saw Stabler still sitting inside. He had his elbows leaning on his knees, head down. She considered his posture. She'd seen it before, but she wasn't sure she could place the feelings behind it this time. She stood staring for just a moment too long as as she started to turn away, Elliot looked up and saw her. Ignoring him just seemed cruel knowing he'd been sitting there all day. She walked into the waiting room and took a seat in the chair next to him.

"Are you supposed to be up walking around?" he asked her.

She didn't answer except to say "I thought I told you to go home, Stabler."

"You did," he replied. "But I didn't want to go."

"You should have, Elliot. I'm fine. This whole extra day is just BS precautionary stuff. You don't need to be hanging around all the time, El. I don't need you to-" He cut off her protests.

"Olivia, knock it off. We were partners, friends, whatever the hell you want to call it, for 10 years. TEN YEARS. You think all of a sudden because you have a new partner, you don't need me? You can just push me away like I was just a convenient perk of the job. That's not how this works."

"It has nothing to do with getting a new partner, Elliot. Maybe it's not that I don't need you, as much as I've realized I CAN'T need you as much as I have. For my sake."

"For YOU, For YOUR sake, for what YOU need! This friendship, this whatever the hell partnership we had, it was a two way street, Olivia. It wasn't all about you, you know. Did you ever stop to think that maybe I needed you as much as you needed me?"

She stood slowly as his words hit her. "No, Elliot," she said slowly. "Let's be honest here, we both know you never needed me like I needed you." She turned without a goodbye and walked slowly back to her room.


	16. Chapter 16

**A/N: Probably just one more, but I've said that before…Or maybe this is it….**

_"It has nothing to do with getting a new partner, Elliot. Maybe it's not that I don't need you, as much as I've realized I CAN'T need you as much as I have. For my sake." _

_"For YOU, For YOUR sake, for what YOU need! This friendship, this whatever the hell partnership we had, it was a two way street, Olivia. It wasn't all about you, you know. Did you ever stop to think that maybe I needed you as much as you needed me?" _

_She stood slowly as his words hit her. "No, Elliot," she said slowly. "Let's be honest here, we both know you never needed me like I needed you." She turned without a goodbye and walked slowly back to her room. _

Chapter 16

he walked slowly down the hall, not looking back. Elliot got up and watched her go, seeing her slumped shoulders and her slow, cautious gait. She walked as if she was afraid the world was going to crash down upon her. He stood in the hallway, unmoving, getting funny looks from the nursing staff that was bustling around the area.

He was sorting out all of the thoughts in his head and formatting how he was going to approach his former partner. He waited until he was fairly certain she was in the room and sitting down; he didn't want her trying to escape on him.

The more he thought about the words she had practically thrown at him, the angrier he got. He strode down the hallway, following her path and took a deep breath when he got to her door. Knocking, but not waiting for a response, he opened the door and entered her room. She was sitting on the bed, legs crossed, not unlike the position in which Olvetti had found her that morning.

She looked up when he entered and sighed "Elliot..." she said in a warning tone.

"No," he interupted her. "You need to listen to me for a minute."

Her head shot up and she stared at him. His voice was firm, but not harsh, and not angry. He was trying very very hard to not sound angry, that would be starting things off on the wrong foot.

"This is complicated." He didn't really know where to begin, but he had to say his piece.

She opened her mouth to say something and he cut her off again. "No, look, just let me say this." He paused again and walked and stood at the foot of the bed, directly ahead of her, leaning against the wall.

"I don't know where you got the idea that the problem here is that you needed me too much. I know I said some horrible things, and did some horrible things. These are things I can never take back, but I have apologized. I could apologize a million times and it wouldn't fix this, would it? And don't tell me that this can't be fixed. We were together for 10 years, Liv. TEN years. At some point in, I would say, the first few months you went from being this green rookie who busted my balls whenever possible, to being my friend who busted my balls whenever she thought I needed it. You're right; things got too complicated. You're right that we were probably closer than we should have been, more dependent that we should have been, but that went both ways. You think because I have a family that I cared about you less? You think that that made things easier for me? Olivia, YOU made things easier for me." He finally took a breath.

"I remember when I was a kid I used to fight with my brother. Like really fight. We would wrestle and throw punches and say the worst things we could think of, trying to draw blood. And we did all that because we knew at the end of the day, we were still brothers. We would still eat at the same table, sleep under the same roof. We could fight and do and say horrible things that we couldn't do or say to anyone else because we knew that we would still never be able to escape each other. Did you ever have that? Ever fight with your mother and know that no matter what you said to her, she'd still be there the next day? I'm not saying it excuses what I did, because it doesn't, nothing does. But..it's when people are that important, you can't just leave."

Olivia didn't answer him, she just stared at him with a jut to her jaw promising him a fight.

"See, Olivia, blood is blood. You can't escape it, even if you want to. And here's the thing, after ten years Olivia…after ten years you are my blood. This is not a relationship that you can just push away, just turn off because things got tough. You can try, but at the end of the day, we will still be eating at the same table and sleeping under the same roof. You don't get to just walk away, because you can't just walk away from your family; they follow you your whole life. And I swear to you I will follow you to the ends of the earth."

He took another breath. He looked at her now, really seeing her for the first time since he started his little tirade. She hadn't moved a muscle, except for her jaw, which he could see was tense and the muscles worked tirelessly clenching and unclenching.

"I am not here, Liv, because I feel responsible for you, because I feel like I am still your partner. Hell, Olvetti can take over all that. I'm here because I am your friend. And I know I screwed up, but I am asking you to forgive me, because I'm not just going to walk out the door and leave. You can't ask me to do that. Not after 10 years. You can't tell me that those years meant nothing to you; I know that's not true. So you might not want me as a partner, but please, be my friend. I've lost my partner; I can't lose my friend too. "

Olivia was looking at him with a wide-eyed look, with her jaw still clamped shut, as if if she relaxed those muscles she would fall apart. She still hadn't even attempted to say anything. He had opened is heart, set free his voice, taken a chance and if she shot him down now he thought he would never recover. He looked down at his feet, trying to gird himself for the worst thing she could say. When she still hadn't said anything after 30 seconds he looked back up at her. She was still sitting in the same position, but now her head was down, she was staring at her hands. When he looked at her, she almost looked small. His focus continued to be drawn to the giant bump on her forehead.

He stared at her, she wasn't moving. She was looking down so he couldn't see her face. She still hadn't moved a muscle. Suddenly she picked up her hands and swiped them at her face repeatedly. He almost thought it was like a pathological twitch until he realized what she was doing: she was wiping away her tears.

She sighed a big sigh, a sigh that covered years. She looked at him, met his eyes with her own, with her jaw still set and said "Okay."

He jerked his head up. "What does that mean?" he asked, slightly panicked.

"Okay, just...Okay," she said. "I mean, I don't know how to do this. I can't say things are going to be fine. I'm no good at relationships, I'm a total workaholic, I run when things get complicated. I don't know HOW to be your friend, Elliot, but…okay."

He nodded. "So, we'll figure it out. Remember, blood is blood, you can't hide from that. Plus, this is me we're talking about, me and you. We already know all of the worst things about one another, so what is there left to run from?"

She opened her mouth to respond, but then closed it again, realizing she didn't have a good response.

"Okay," she said simply. And for the first time in a long time, it was. It wasn't good, it wasn't fine, but maybe, just maybe, it was okay.


End file.
